Ethanol fuel in test process

23/05/2008 V8 Supercars has started fuel experiments in preparation for the 85 percent ethanol blended fuel called E85.

Chief Executive Officer, Wayne Cattach, said V8 Supercars was also getting technical advice on changing the fuel blend.

“If it all stacks up then we will proceed next year, which is our intention,” Cattach said.

Cattach indicated it was not just a matter of pouring the fuel into the tank.

“There’s a lot of issues as there was when we went to E5,” he said.

“There’s a higher consumption issue we have to deal with.

“There’s a whole lot of technical issues we might have to deal with in terms of the fuel equipment itself and so on and so forth, so that’s got to be properly worked through.”

V8 Supercars Motorsport and Events General Manager, Shane Howard, warned while it was hoped E85 will be introduced next year, it may get postponed to 2010.

“The E85 is in full review so once we evaluate things properly with proper research and have an understanding of it and we can make a recommendation on how we move forward with it,” he said.

Cattach said V8 Supercars Australia had no immediate short-term plans for the category to become more climate change friendly, besides the E85 fuel and other already announced programs.

“We’re not going to be racing solar cars, we’re not going to be racing hybrids,” he stressed.

“We are what we are but we are part of the community and we understand we have got to do our bit.

“And I think our bit is to clean our own act up and carry the message to others.”

Cattach referred to the Racing Green Program, a commitment to plant more than 15,000 trees this year and education in schools as other environmental initiatives.

“We are pushing ahead within the confines of what we are able to do pretty rapidly,” he said.

“So I think if we can deliver what we’ve said we are going to do in the short-term, we are going to be in pretty good shape and ahead of most motor sport categories in the world.”

Cattach said V8 Supercars had no plans to implement the Kinetic Energy Recovery System (KERS), which will turn excess energy into usable energy for Formula One cars when implemented from 2009.

“All that will do is drive us into another cost spiral and we want to go the other way,” Cattach said.