World Solar Challenge 2009 underway: 1,864-mile solar car race across Australia, part of Global Green Challenge

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The leading cars in this year’s Global Green Challenge solar car race have passed the halfway point in their epic 1,864-mile (3,000-kilometre) race across some of Australia's harshest terrain from Darwin to Adelaide.

The Global Green Challenge - an evolution of the acclaimed World Solar Challenge - is the world's leading, cross-continental showcase of the latest advances in hybrid, electric, solar, low emission, and alternative energy vehicles. The race, which is now in its tenth year, was pioneered by the South Australian Tourism Commission and aims to highlight the latest advances in hybrid, electric, solar and alternative energy vehicles.

The typical competition car looks like an earthbound space ship, low and flat, with all horizontal surfaces covered with solar panels and a small bubble canopy for the driver. The average speed (in traffic) is 64 miles per hour, according to the Michigan Engineering Forum, but the cars are capable of going much faster. The race is gruelling with the course taking teams through Australia's desert heartland where temperatures can exceed 122F (50C). Drivers and crew are required to camp in the outback at end of each day.

The Challenge attracted 38 teams, many of them from colleges and high schools, in 17 countries. The race is about halfway finished, and more than 30 teams are still on track to the finish later in the week. In the lead is a team from Tokai University in Japan (using Sharp solar cells), followed in hot pursuit by the Nuon Solar Team from the Netherlands and the University of Michigan. Homegrown Australian teams, no doubt familiar with the terrain, were doing well, M.I.T.’s entry was in fourth place, and a Turkish group from Istanbul Technical University was in 10th.

The solar race is part of the Global Green Challenge, which also includes the Eco Challenge, which involves production and prototype eco-friendly vehicles that are, or soon will be, available to the public.

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Photos courtesy of Global Green Challenge, EPA, AFP / Getty, and Reuters

Original Source: Global Green Challenge, NY Times, Telegraph, and AFP