AlphaTauri F1 team commits to sustainability program
What better time than the week of Scuderia AlphaTauri’s home race, the Made in Italy e dell’Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, which takes place at Imola on 18th April, to look at where we are with our Sustainability Program and what is planned for the future. It involves a complete ecological change, to benefit our wellbeing and that of our environment, which therefore also benefits our Emilia Romagna region.
The decade that began in 2020 will see an epochal change in the relationship between Formula 1 and the environment. It follows the path set out in the FIA Environmental Strategy 2020 to 2030, which itself is included in the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
The common goal of the FIA, Formula 1, ourselves and all other teams is set out in Countdown to Zero by 2030. It involves a systematic reduction of CO2 emissions from everything relating to the production of racing cars in our factory, on track activity, logistics, travel and racing. Various targets have been set to reach a net zero carbon footprint from factory to flag, which means that the entire Formula 1 operation should reach zero carbon emissions by 2030. Formula 1 wishes to be seen as an example of environmental sustainability worldwide, by contributing to the acceleration of technologies that will decarbonize the planet.
How and where will this be achieved?
In the factory and our hospitality unit
We are committed to achieving a complete ecological transition in our factory and our hospitality unit at the race track, by using renewable energy, reducing CO2 emissions and minimizing waste in all areas including water and food.
At the track
Formula 1 cars will continue to be the most powerful and efficient cars in the world, running on sustainable fuel and using hybrid technology for the power unit. Formula 1 thus remains in the vanguard of efficiency in the automotive sector.
Travelling
We will continue to be as logistically efficient as is feasible, moving our equipment as efficiently as possible, using means of transport with the lowest possible impact on the environment.
Towards Net Zero
To offset unavoidable CO2 emissions, we are committed to implementing workable carbon sequestration programs.
Reaching net zero emissions by 2030 involves constant and gradual reduction of carbon emissions, while at the same time obtaining carbon credits to offset the emissions into the atmosphere that cannot be completely eliminated. It is a strategy with well-defined targets which will be monitored on a yearly basis. Scuderia AlphaTauri will be complying with this, the starting point being our carbon footprint from 2019, the year before the Sustainability Program began.
An in-house assessment, carried out in conjunction with a specialist firm concluded that our team produced around 15,000 tons of CO2 in 2019.
This was therefore our starting point heading to a complete ecological change that, through various initiatives and actions, will lead to the common goal of Countdown to Zero in 2030. We are committed to reducing the figure year by year and the process began in 2020. The majority of these emissions, 70%, comes from activity within our factory, therefore this is the area on which we are focusing the most.
Two main initiatives are being adopted: the use of green electrical energy, generated from 100% renewable sources, and shortly, the use of a heating system using energy from wine production and local garden waste. This last initiative will be up and running this autumn through a partnership with the Caviro Group, an Italian leader in the wine sector, with a biomass thermo-electric power plant just a few hundred meters from our factory in Faenza, the connection made through a dedicated pipeline.