Bentley cements commitment to renewable fuels, with bio-fuel powered racecar

Simran Rastogi Updated: April 15, 2021, 01:25 PM IST

Bentley is returning to Pikes Peak for the third year running in a bid to add another record to its name, but with a racecar powered by renewable fuels, in this case a biofuel-based petrol. The Continental GT3 Pikes Peak racecar for 2021 will spearhead Bentley's commitment to researching alternate fuels that are cleaner burning than fossil fuels, and sustainable. Bentley estimates 80 per cent of its cars are still on the road, so it would pay off for Britain's most historied automaker to look to a sustainable way of fuelling them into the future.

Bentley, as part of its forward-looking Beyond100 programme, will offer hybrid versions of all new vehicles, ahead of going electric-only post 2030, in accordance with UK's ban on the sale of new ICE-vehicles. It also says it'll look into both biofuels and e-fuels (synthetic fuels) over the course of research to meet a long-term goal of a sustainable fuel for existing customers. The next step for Bentley is to adopt renewable fuels at its Crewe factory, and for the company fleet.

For the Pikes Peak programme, Bentley will test various blends of fuels with a potential reduction of up to 85 per cent of greenhouse gases. Bentley returns to the time-attack event with Rhys Millen at the wheel in the hope of capturing the Time Attack 1 record, which will need a timing under 9min 36sec over the near 5,000ft hillclimb that spans 156 corners and 20 kilometres. Recently, Porsche also announced that its 911 GT3 Cup racecar will run on synthetic fuel in race conditions, as part of a similar goal of finding a cleaner, sustainable fuel for its ICE-vehicles.