Japanese Team Crosses Australia, Takes Solar Car Challenge

After nearly four days, 1,860 miles, and lots of baking Australian sun, a team from Japan's Tokai University edged out 31 other competitors to bring home a solar victory in the 2009 Global Green Challenge

By Mike Spinelli Posted 10.28.2009 at 10:07 am 6 Comments

Japan's Tokai Challenger Tokai University

A team of solar-car scientists from Japan's Tokai University turned the intense rays of central Australia into victory in the 2009 Global Green Challenge. The team covered nearly 1,860 miles over four days in their solar-powered Tokai Challenger to claim first place among the Challenge's solar-vehicle field.

The win shut down a four-win streak by Dutch utility Nuon, which as of this writing was still battling the University of Michigan for second place. The Tokai Challenger, which is equipped with six square meters of 1.8 kW compound solar cells developed by Sharp for outer-space applications, placed fourth in qualifying at an average speed of 50.87mph. During the race, the team reportedly took the lead on day one, and stayed there all the way to the finish line.

Thirty-two solar vehicles from 16 countries made the start of the 2009 Global Green Challenge last Sunday. The bi-annual Global Green Challenge has separate categories for hybrid, electric, and other forms of alternative energy vehicles. Tokai's victory is the first by a Japanese team since 1993 when the Honda Dream II took first.

[via Gizmag]

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6 Comments

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guythatlikestor...

10/28/09 at 2:00 pm

It sure reminds me of a movie.

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chieffranky

10/28/09 at 2:26 pm

Wish we had some video on it, perhaps I'll check youtube. Only around 50mph though? Interesting race. Maybe when solar cells are extrenuously cheaper they'll be used as a common extra source of power on cars. By the by, I wonder whatever became of that plan to put solar cells in roads...

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opera

10/29/09 at 9:20 am

thanks alot

www.m-gam3a.com/vb

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quasi44

10/29/09 at 9:19 pm

So, no word on Sharp's panel efficiencies, nor the cost if you or I wanted to build a car from Tokai Universities' specs. Or some other application, as would be my case.

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capnthepeafarmer

11/02/09 at 10:48 am

Well just an off the cuff calculation, on average there is about 250 watts per square meter on the earth's surface. So 250 W/M^2 * 6M = 1500 W.

This would infer that the cells are better than 100% efficiency, but since thats impossible its better to assume that the insolation in Australia is a bit higher than average.

And taking a look at the highest insolation values for these months in Australia we get about 325 W/M^2. Plug that back in and I get 1950 W. so at 1.8KW/1.95KW its about 92% efficiency.

Still just off the cuff observation from the given info.

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