The first electric super car – the Nemesis – designed and built entirely in the UK, has today broken the UK electric car land-speed record – reaching 151 mph.
The previous record – 137mph – was set by the grandson of legendary speed-merchant Sir Malcolm Campbell.
The Nemesis is the brainchild of Dale Vince OBE, who founded the world’s first green electricity company, Ecotricity, in Stroud Gloucestershire, and was driven by 21-year-old Gloucester racing driver Nick Ponting at Elvington Airfield near York.
The Motor Sport Association was on hand to officially verify the record, with the ‘Nemesis’ needing to complete two runs in opposite directions along the runway within 1 hour to account for prevailing winds – the average speed of the two runs provides the official time.
Mr Vince said: “This is brilliant. We built the Nemesis to smash the stereotype of electric cars as something Noddy would drive – slow, boring, not cool – and I think we’ve done exactly that today.
“Hopefully this will further stimulate debate about the future of transport in Britain and how we’ll be getting around when the world runs out of oil.
“What we’ve been able to demonstrate is that wind-powered cars are not just feasible, but can be a load of fun.”
Powered entirely by 100% green electricity made by Ecotricity’s network of 53 windmills around the UK, the Nemesis was designed and built in less than two years by an ‘A-team’ of leading British motorsport engineers in Norfolk.
Unlike a combustion engine, electric cars have 100% torque from a standing start and in initial speed tests last year the road-legal Nemesis did 0-100mph in 8.5 seconds.
The Nemesis completed two runs along Elvington Airfield over a one mile distance, with Nick Ponting breaking the record on the first set of consecutive runs with an average speed of 148 mph.
Ponting further extended the record later in the day, to 151 mph.
Ponting said: “It hasn’t really sunk in yet that we are in the record books. It was nice to break the record once and then smash it again – which proved a point really. They’ve done such a good job with the car. It’s an amazing result.”
The Nemesis can travel from 100-150 miles between charges depending on driving style and can be charged from empty in under 30mins using rapid-charging infrastructure.
Last summer the grandson of Sir Malcolm Campbell, Don Wales, attempted to break his own 137mph UK land speed record for an electric car – but ran into trouble on the beach at Pendine Sands in Carmarthenshire.
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