Evolutions in the green energy road car market were evident on the fringes of the World Endurance Championship round at Fuji as Aston Martin Racing dabbled with solar power in association with team partner Hanergy.
Hanergy, a Chinese solar power specialist manufacturer, will act as an accompanying power source to assist AMR’s ancillary systems in automotive applications that normally draw power from the vehicles main engine.
The solar units were visible as two rows of ultra-low weight photovoltaic cells on the roof of the #97 Aston Martin Racing V8 Vantage.
With the Fuji, the cells were merely installed rather than completely connected, to test the installation, but AMR hopes to install a voltage measuring unit and eventually supply voltage to the Aston Martin’s before the end of the 2014 FIA WEC season.
With Aston making a head-start in the development of solar systems for the road car market, the relatively small car manufacturer hopes to align itself and attract emerging technologies that might be under the radar of larger manufacturers.
Should the Hanergy experiment be a success, the transition to road technology could be sooner than expected given GTE’s correlative road technology.