Team RAC announce plans to go carbon neutral

Team RAC today announced plans to neutralise its carbon output, tying in with a wider initiative endorsed by parent company; international savings, investment and insurance group Aviva.

This new zero carbon policy has been embraced by Team RAC at the start of the Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship, with the second round taking place at Rockingham this coming Sunday 22nd April.

The move by Team RAC marks a significant step towards limiting the division’s overall environmental impact and follows on naturally from initiatives introduced last year. Most notably, Team RAC switched to bio fuels for the British Touring Car Championship last season and became the first team to attain a podium finish using the substance.

Whilst the motorsport industry is responsible for advancing car safety technology. It needs to adopt an environmentally friendly approach and RAC is determined to spearhead moves towards a more responsible outlook.

Team RAC plans to offset the carbon it uses by investing in projects that generate carbon credits such as energy efficiency, fuel displacement and carbon free energy sources such as wind power. It will offset its emissions on a retrospective basis starting with emissions generated in 2006.

Alastair Pegg, Director of RAC Marketing, commented: “RAC are committed to making a positive contribution to the environment and will continue to explore ways to reduce carbon output, use green energy and investigate new fuel technology.”

Motorsport Development UK is also renewing efforts to make the sector more environmentally responsible, and has contracted AEA Technology’s Momenta division to deliver the Energy Efficient Motor Sport (EEMS) programme through until 2009.

Momenta’s Andy Gilchrist stated: “The UK has a long heritage of being a global leader in motorsport. This exciting programme gives us the opportunity to support the UK motorsport sector to meet the challenge of energy efficiency, become the world centre for alternative and efficient fuels and set new global standards.”

Richard Harvey, group Chief Executive at Aviva explained, “Our decision to go carbon neutral is a serious engagement and not something we have entered into lightly. Climate change is clearly the most serious environmental challenge facing the world, and as a forward thinking organisation we are keen to play our part in addressing this challenge and hope other companies may follow our example.”

Aviva’s green stance has been put into practice with the provision of innovative products aimed at helping their customers reduce their CO2 emissions.