The Sunswift IVy solar car runs on power generated by silicon solar cells, and produces around 1,200 watts the same power as it takes to run a toaster. In 2009, the car hit a top speed of 103km/h during the 3,000 km Global Green Challenge race from Darwin to Adelaide in 2009, in which the team won their category.
"We broke the record at 10.32 this morning," said Sunswift project manager Daniel Friedman. "The Guinness World Book of Records adjudicators were on hand, so its all official. Weve even been handed our certificate."
Friedman said the team was excited the car performed so well during the challenge, held at the HMAS Albatross navy base airstrip in Nowra. "We were expecting to get our peak sun at noon, so the fact we broke the record so early was a great result. We hope the news will spur a lot more interest in solar energy and the debate about renewable energy technology."
The carbon-fiber race car is said to be the same size as an average sedan, but half
the height and 1/10th of the weight of an average car. Powered completely by the
sun and creating no emissions during the operation cycle, it has a reported top speed of approximately 115 km/hr, and an estimated average speed of 85 km/hr.
This content is protected by copyright and may not be reused. If you want to cooperate with us and would like to reuse some of our content, please contact: editors@pv-magazine.com.
By submitting this form you agree to pv magazine using your data for the purposes of publishing your comment.
Your personal data will only be disclosed or otherwise transmitted to third parties for the purposes of spam filtering or if this is necessary for technical maintenance of the website. Any other transfer to third parties will not take place unless this is justified on the basis of applicable data protection regulations or if pv magazine is legally obliged to do so.
You may revoke this consent at any time with effect for the future, in which case your personal data will be deleted immediately. Otherwise, your data will be deleted if pv magazine has processed your request or the purpose of data storage is fulfilled.
Further information on data privacy can be found in our Data Protection Policy.