Sink, swim or drive electric?

Join Formula E

Sign in or create your Formula E account

It's quick, easy and free to sign up

You'll get access to:

  • Helmet

    News. Analysis. Exclusive Features

  • Schedule

    Priority Booking. Early Bird Pricing

  • Trophy

    Competitions. Discounts. Experiences

  • Podium

    Predict. Vote. Win.

TO CONTINUE READING...

You will need to sign in or create a Formula E account.

Sink, swim or drive electric?

Sink, swim or drive electric?

Looking forward to the New York E-Prix? Well, funnily enough, so are we but scientists at Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory predict that parts of the city could be underwater in the future.

But it's not just New York that's at risk. Having developed a tool to predict which cities could flood as different portions of the ice sheet melt, London, Vancouver, Boston and Los Angeles - to name but a few - may also be affected.

Of course, you don't need us to tell you that sea levels are on the rise but the truth is, they are as the planet continues to heat up. Developed in California, Nasa's latest tool provides the most accurate map of sea-level rises to date and works by calculating the effect gravity, the expansion of the ground beneath the newly-melted ice and the Earth's rotation have on the way water is distributed around the world. Sounds technical but simply, it provides - for each city - a picture of which glaciers, ice sheets and ice caps pose the greatest threat.

For London, it suggests the city could be significantly affected by changes in the north-western part of the Greenland ice sheet, while for New York, the area of concern is the ice sheet's entire northern and eastern portions. Click HERE to see the effect where you are.

 

Only last year, current FIA Formula E Champion Lucas di Grassi and the series' Founder and CEO Alejandro Agag embarked on a campaign to increase awareness about the shrinking ice caps and rising sea levels. Alongside driving the all-electric Formula E development car across the ice cap in Greenland, the campaign marked the start of Southampton University's research into the behaviour of ice sheets by placing a tracking beacon on an iceberg that had broken away.

While cities like Paris, Oxford and London take action to mediate the effects of climate change by announcing bans on the sale of combustion engined cars, Formula E continues to promote all-electric mobility with races in 11 iconic cities, across five continents. With sea levels having risen between 10 and 20 centimetres in the past 100 years, the switch to sustainable all-electric transport has never been more relevant.

So, what's it to be - sink, swim or drive electric? We'll stick to the latter, thanks.