Melbourne is humming with roaring engines, zooming around Albert Park Lake as motorsport fans flock to the 2024 Australian Grand Prix.
While Formula 1 (F1) is synonymous with speed, luxury, and travel, there’s also the undeniable environmental impact of putting on a record 24 races fuelled by burning fossil fuels.
Five years ago F1 set out goals to help reduce its polluting image, aiming to achieve carbon neutrality by 2030 and deliver 100 per cent sustainable fuels by 2026.
It drew criticism when tree planting and carbon credit offsets were announced as part of the plan to reduce 256,000 tonnes of carbon emissions in a race season.
Experts told SBS News that it’s easy to concentrate on sport’s carbon emissions but argue the series can be a great vehicle for sustainability and change.
So what strides has F1 achieved? And how far has it got to go?
What’s behind F1’s carbon footprint?
F1 emits the equivalent of roughly 143,000 flights from Sydney to London, according to its 2019 sustainability report.
But the majority of those emissions do not come from the V6 engines speeding around the tracks.
The bulk of the footprint, 72 per cent, comes from logistics including the movement of equipment as well as the impact of jetting around the personnel from 10 teams.
In its 2019 report, F1 detailed its goal to reduce its “carbon footprint from factory to flag” through net zero carbon powered cars, efficient logistics and travel, 100 per cent renewable factories, and credible offsets.
F1 calendar grows, as ‘the circus’ shrinks
In 2024, as F1 expanded to 24 locations across five continents, its carbon emissions pledge fell under further scrutiny.
Sammy Diasinos, a senior lecturer in mechanical engineering at Macquarie University, said the governing body for auto racing events was helping drive remote solutions that reduced emissions.
“The FIA has started to put restrictions on the teams… the biggest impact on the environment is the transportation of the entire circus from one the race venue to another,” he told SBS News.
“By starting to reduce the amount of equipment and the number of personnel that are allowed to travel at each event, what we’re finding is teams are having to put remote solutions in place to be able to assist with that.”
In practice, this means fewer engineers physically in the pit lane. Instead, they are fed vehicle data to a control center back at their factories and support drivers remotely.
Similarly, Sky 1, the race broadcaster for all English-speaking countries, has reduced its footprint by transporting only necessary gear like cameras to each country. All production takes place back in England.
All 24 rounds in the 2024 Formula 1 calendar.
However, the addition of three races since the 2019 calendar has been criticised for being at odds with its ambition to drive down logistics and travel emissions.
Diasinos worked as an F1 engineer for six years, at one stage leading a whole team of aerodynamicists, and said the industry has made several changes to reduce its impact.
He recalls that during his time with the Toyota F1 team, they ran two large-scale wind tunnels side by side 24 hours a day, seven days a week — the only exception being Christmas Day.
“Now I believe that a Formula One team wouldn’t be able to run even a single wind tunnel for more than 12 hours a day, five days a week,” Diasinos said.
“So that’s a huge saving in energy just from a change in the regulations being imposed on the teams.”
Driving the race for innovation
In F1, competition among teams drives innovation, shaving crucial time off each lap.
Michelle O’Shea, a senior lecturer in sports management at Western Sydney University, said this drives technological advancements that trickle down to everyday consumers.
“They can experiment with different technologies and they can look at things like production processes,” she told SBS News.
“F1 is saying is, yes, our sport has emissions, but we are also working at the cutting edge of technology and any learnings that we take in terms of reducing emissions, we will be able to take to the general public.”
She points to companies competing to create the first 100 per cent sustainable fuel by 2026 as an example, which will benefit the wider consumer.
Teams have smaller crews physically at the race pit stops as the f1 aims to bring down carbon emissions attributed to travel. Source: AAP / SportPix
O’Shea also said the F1 had the leverage to encourage its suppliers, like tyre suppliers, to adhere to strict environmental credibility standards as it looked to lower its emissions.
Diasinos credited the F1 with advancing hybrid engine systems that help make the everyday automotive industry more sustainable.
In its 2022 update, Head of F1 Sustainability Ellen Jones praised the progress made in the first three years.
“The work that’s going on behind the scenes to bring this strategy to life is tireless and we are confident that we are building strong foundations for the future of our business and sport,” she said.
SBS News has contacted the Australian Grand Prix about sustainability initiatives in Australia and Formula 1’s broader 2030 goal.
When asked about local initiatives, Australian Grand Prix Corporation Sustainability Manager Sarah Lowe said “as a promoter of Formula 1, the Australian Grand Prix Corporation (AGPC) has been working alongside F1 to meet their climate commitments.”
Why does F1 stand accused of greenwashing?
The F1 is green-washed, claims Rod Campbell, a research director at progressive think tank The Australia Institute.
It’s a term used when organisations misrepresent their environmental friendliness and give a false impression of their aims.
“Formula One’s claim to be becoming carbon neutral is pretty questionable… I mean, it’ll all be about carbon offsets the integrity of which is problematic around the world,” he said.
Campbell said F1 could not legitimately offset its carbon emissions while promoting fossil fuel companies like Shell and Saudi-backed Aramco.
He said to curb this dirty image, F1 would have to ditch any sponsors affiliated with fossil fuels and go electric.
While Formula E is an electric alternative to F1, both Diasinos and O’Shea agreed it would never replace the existing league.
An F1 spokesperson denied accusations of greenwashing, telling SBS News that claims it was predominantly reducing its emissions through carbon offsets were inaccurate.
When questioned about accusations that F1 was legitimising fossil fuel expansion through its sponsors, the spokesperson didn’t directly respond, instead pointing to its sustainable fuel advancements.
What else should F1 do?
While O’Shea praised technology advancements, she was critical of the lack of transparency around F1 plans to reduce its carbon emissions and what it had achieved to date.
She said increasingly consumers were seeing through the “smoke and mirrors” of initiatives such as carbon offsets and questioning the number of stops in the tour.
“If they were very genuine about [reducing emissions]… rather than an expansion, we would see a contraction. We would see fewer F1 events across the globe,” she said.
Diasinos said the F1 could reduce the current FIA cost cap, which he said drives economic cost targets but deters investment in sustainability.
“One of the consequences of putting that cost cap in place to make it economically sustainable is it might make it more challenging for teams to invest in things that are not directly performance-related on the track,” he added.
He said it was important not to lose sight of what the F1 is, which is a competition that brings joy to millions of motorsport fans.
“F1 has always been about the advancement of technology… but because it’s fun for people to watch on TV, companies want to invest in it,” Diasinos said.
“If that investment is focused on the right places, then F1 has the potential to be a great vehicle for promoting sustainability moving forward and making it possible.”
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