BBC World News is on a green drive; premiers 'Racing Green'

BBC World News is broadcasting a new series Racing Green starting 1 January 2011. The eight part documentary follows a team of five young engineers from Imperial College London, as they attempt the 26,000 KM journey along the Pan-American Highway, in the electric car they designed and built.

Project Manager Alex Schey initiated the Racing Green Endurance project in 2005. The objective was to design a good looking battery electric car with the largest range in the world, and to test it by driving it along the world's longest road.

Alex said: "We wanted to have a car that was exciting to look at, so that when people saw it driving along they would want to find out more. It worked perfectly - at every stop we were surrounded by people from all different backgrounds ' from businessmen in San Francisco to a 200 strong crowd at the Guatemalan border ' it is a great way to begin the conversation and to tell everybody more about electric vehicles. They were all surprised when we told them that it could run for over 500km on around $5 of electricity."

Mary Wilkinson, Commissioning Editor, BBC World News said: "BBC World News is delighted to be airing Racing Green. It's an interesting and entertaining mix of adventure, innovative technology and sheer enterprise shown by the team."

Their trip began in Chena Hot Springs, North Alaska in July 2010. From there the car and the team travelled to Vancouver, down to San Francisco, across Texas, to Mexico and finally down through South America, finishing in Argentina. During the 70 days of driving the team faced a number of challenges including being stopped 46 times by the police, the car catching fire, crashing the car, and tropical rainstorms.

Series producer Claudio von Planta, whose credits include Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman's Long Way Round and Long Way Down, began following the team in November 2009 to film the documentary, which will be aired on BBC World News on Saturdays at 7.30 and 20.30 GMT and Sundays at 13.30 and 17.30 GMT from 1 January 2011.