When Car Racing Becomes Green Innovation

Tyler Hamilton at the Toronto Star made an interesting suggestion today: alternative vehicle auto racing would fuel innovation.

Predicated by last week's announcement that GM would be cutting back on NASCAR sponsorships as part of it's US$10 billion budget reduction plan, Hamilton made the realization that; besides helping to ensure the survival of beer bellies of America; NASCAR and other racing events have traditionally been testing grounds for new automotive technologies before being put into mass production. 

Perhaps racing events can do for electric cars what auto racing has done for traditional automobiles (fuel injection, crumple zones, etc.).

This is not to say that alternative fuel car racing hasn't been around for awhile. For years, university teams have racing solar cars in events such as the North American Solar Challenge, where teams are currently racing across the continent from Dallas to Calgary. But such events are hardly spectator sports, and it's a long way to go to take an undergraduate project and apply it to mass market production. If a group of 20-year olds can race across the continent using little much but spare parts, time and gumption, imagine what would be possible if major automakers came on board? Would we be talking about solar cell efficiency the same way we talk about engine torque?