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© Racing Green EnduranceStudents from Imperial College with the SR3 car they are currently turning into an electric vehicle.
London: The world's first major racing challenge for renewable vehicles will see six modified sports cars zip around 40,000 km of the northern hemisphere, through mountains and deserts, and across six continents.

The development of electric vehicles that are up to the challenge may encourage improved technology that could eventually filter down into electric consumer cars, says one of the teams involved in the project.

Vehicles are one of the greatest sources of carbon dioxide pollution. One possible solution to this will be the switch from petrol-driven to electric vehicles, but the widespread adoption of electric cars faces a challenge in that people perceive them to be low-performance vehicles.

Zero Race

In an effort to prove that electric vehicles can be high performance, the 'Zero Race' will see six specially designed, zero-emission sports cars race around the Northern Hemisphere over a period of 80 days.

"This will be a massive... demonstration to the public that the technology is here and viable and we can actually use it to lower our carbon emissions and go towards more sustainable transport solutions," said Alex Schey a student involved in one of the teams.

His team, Racing Green Endurance, is made up of students at Imperial College in London, England. The students gave a presentation to reporters this week during the World Conference of Science Journalists, also in London.

Due to set off from the Geneva Motor Show in March 2010, the challenge will see the vehicles travel through locations as far flung as Saudi Arabia, Turkey and China, before taking a boat to the U.S and Canada and then flying back to Europe to complete the circuit.

"Crazy terrains and climates"

Existing electric vehicles are not suitable for the harsh conditions the challengers will have to face, so the various teams will be modifying existing sports cars or building them from scratch.

The students at Imperial College have been donated an SR3 vehicle by racing car manufacturer Radical Sportscar worth £50,000 (A$102,000). They are currently turning this into a high-performance electric vehicle.

"We have a whole range of climates so not only do we have to design the system to be able to go for 40,000 km, pretty much non-stop, but also through crazy different terrains and climates," Schey said.

According to the team, the biggest challenge may be getting batteries that are powerful enough within the constraints of their limited budget. Trying to secure sponsorship during a recession is another problem, they admitted.