At the recent Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach weekend Indy Health and Fitness, in collaboration with Gen 2 Motorsport and Clean Green Nation, unveiled motorsport’s first carbon neutral transport-trailer in the United States. Through the technological expertise of Clean Green Nation, the Indy Health and Fitness trailer ran the entire weekend on sustainable energy. The two-vehicle transporter was powered by a combination of solar panels, battery-assist, and wind-assist technology, and adapted with LED lighting, and heat-resistant barriers. A variety of batteries accumulated and stored the energy from the solar panels; enough to power all of the air-conditioning, lighting, and plasma screens in both facilities for the entire event.
Also exhibited along with the transport-trailer were A2B carbon neutral electric bicycles-a very high-tech rendition of an electric-powered vehicle classified as a ‘bicycle’ as it has pedal apparatus, and does not need a permit to operate. It sustains itself on a single charge and can go for 25 miles at a speed of 25 miles per hour, with a supplementary battery pack that gives an extra 15 miles. This particular vehicle is designed to replace the gas-powered scooters and carts used at racing circuits by teams and league officials.
Gen 2 Motorsport partner, Roger Brummett commented on the weekend interest in the “green” exhibit. “Several thousand people stopped by the display over the weekend to examine the various technologies, and that not only included the general public moving through the paddock, but also a variety of team reps and sponsoring entities from the various leagues who participated at Long Beach.” They had a chance to see the only sustainable program of its kind in motorsports at this time. After four days, the transporter that sat there had a carbon footprint of exactly net-zero.” Added Brummett,“everyone was wowed by the technology- people have read about the potential to green a particular facility, and they’ve heard about carbon neutral, but this was an opportunity to show a visual representation of that, and to see it done in motorsports; most people don’t believe there is a concept to apply sustainability to the sport of racing. This was the only facility, in a sea of transporters that was producing and consuming its own energy.”
Brummett also noted a lot of interest in the A2B bikes from race fans and teams, “A lot of fans asked for info about the zero-emission bikes. We had interest from grandfathers wanting to ride bikes with grandkids, but maybe had knee replacements and saw solutions in these bikes. We also had younger people who saw it as a high tech and completely sustainable, green concept. And, we had race teams see a solution to replace gas-powered utility vehicles they currently use.”
The collaborative group feels this program is the first step in a series of viable solutions that can be used to green motorsports. “Initially we partnered with the Rose Hulman Institute for a six-month study to determine what we could use to show sustainability in motorsports, said Brummett, “our plan is to use Indy Health and Fitness and Clean Green Nation to green every aspect of the motorsports industry. We can’t green every aspect of the cars over the wall yet, but we can on the operations side of racing. We used IndyCar to launch this project because this series, with its use of biofuels; sugar and corn based ethanol, and its partnership with Apex Brasil, is clearly at the leading edge of trying to green motorsports. With Indy Health and Fitness, and its owner, Dr. Rob Schroeder, we were able to network with all the teams in the IndyCar paddock, so this was an ideal gateway for us to showcase our program, and of course Dr. Schroeder understands technology, and the application of these processes, and was willing to use his facility to illustrate the technology and applications.”
For further information on Clean Green Nation and their renewable energy equipment and energy efficient products (even for RV’s and boats), check out http://cleangreennation.com/
For more information on Indy Health and Fitness, go to http://www.indyhealthfitness.com/index.asp
Origonal article at http://www.indyinformer.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=home.content_detail&ctid=5379
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