Honda F1's "Earth Car" was launched last season, forgoing the traditional livery of sponsors logos and replaced by a digitalised picture of the world taken from space. It did its job, creating headlines around the world and helped position the Japanese carmaker as a leader in the debate on renewable energy.
Nick Fry, the Honda team principal, said: "Unless Formula One can become a contributor to the technology that might help the environment, it's highly likely the sport will become a dinosaur. There is a feeling that we need to tie together, much more than in the past, the technology in Formula One and the technology that goes into road cars,"
Critics say the notion that F1 is in any way environmentally friendly is laughable: Jenson Button's car alone emits over 50 tonnes of carbon dioxide across a Formula One season, more than five times higher than the average Briton produces in 12 months. The cars emit around 1,500g of carbon dioxide per kilometre, almost nine times more than the average new road vehicle.
Figures like these led Greenpeace to describe F1 as "the most polluting sport on the planet".
"Oil is the problem, cars are the solution", is the mantra of Iain Carson, co-author of Zoom: The Global Race to Fuel the Car of the Future, which tracks the incestuous relationship between the car and oil industries. The book's findings suggest divorce is imminent.
Carson says Toyota is five to seven years ahead of the competition in terms of developing the car of the future: "It is no coincidence that Toyota is the most profitable and challenging as the biggest car company in the world, because it's also the technological leader, the one that has tried to solve the environmental problem of fuel emissions."
The fast-growing economies of China and India, he says, will have huge implications for the industry. There are nine personal vehicles per thousand eligible drivers in China and 11 for every thousand Indians, compared with 1,148 for every thousand Americans.
Toyota's pioneering work with the Prius hybrid is the result of a long-term, technologically-driven approach. "The Prius is not exactly the car of the future," says Carson. "It is a step along the way."
The clever computer software and electronics that have gone into the petrol electric hybrid are the basis of the next generation of vehicles. In 10 years it will be common to see fuel cells in cars, with hydrogen generating the electricity.
F1 Green moves
Proposed changes for 2009
Replace 2.4-litre V8s with 2.2-litre turbocharged V6s
Engines to be around 770 horsepower - about 100hp less than present
Engines to run five grands prix without changes
Four-wheel drive and traction-control systems
Power-boost facility to enhance overtaking
Cars to use ecologically sympathetic biofuels rather than fossil fuels
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