A new cross European expedition of electric cars got under way on Sunday, starting in Paris, in a bid to promote electric mobility powered by renewable energy.
Called the World Advanced Vehicle Expedition (WAVE), the twenty teams which set off from the French capital at the beginning of the week, are now headed for Prague, and will cover an amazing 2,900 kilometres across eight countries by the time they arrive in the Czech capital on September 25th-powered the full way by clean, renewable sources of electricity. Each team has to produce their own electricity from renewable sources for the event. This electricity has to be fed into the grid system in the home country of each team to offset what they use on their travels. Teams has sourced electricity from solar, wind, hydro and biomass.
The teams come from around the world, each driving one sort of electric vehicle or another including electric vans, cars, three-wheelers, motorbikes and e-bikes. Entrants have come from as far away as the United States, India and the United Emirates.
Established by eco-adventurer Louis Palmer, famous for his world tour in a solar-powered model called the Solar Taxi, the WAVE expedition’s special mission is to promote electric mobility and along the way, with the 20 participating teams visiting schools, businesses, government and places of interest to spread the word. Following the success of the Solartaxi, Palmer initiated the ZERO Race last year, the first race for electric cars around the world in 80 days before establishing WAVE this year.
WAVE will pass through France, Belgium, Germany, Austria, Liechtenstein, Switzerland, the Netherlands and the Czech Republic, passing through towns and cities including Lille, Brussels, Stuttgart, Frankfurt, Lucerne, Vaduz, Salzburg, Linz and Brno along the way.
Electric vehicles taking part include a Twike model, a Skoda Octavia EV, a Tremola, Tesla Roadster, Citroen C-Zero, Mitsubishi i-MiEV, Nissan Leaf, smart EV, Scout car and a REVA L-ion (known as a G-Wiz over here).
One of the entrants, Mahindra Reva, which is sending a G-Wiz on the epic journey, is not only sourcing its electricity from biomass but has partnered with Grow-Trees, an official partner of the UNEP Billion Tree Campaign, to plant ‘one tree for every kilometre’ driven during the expedition.
Due to arrive in Prague on Sunday 25th September, you can follow the WAVE teams on their journey through the daily blog on the challenge’s website: http://wave2011.net/en/wave-2011-blog/
