A pioneering project in green motorsport has taken another step forward after the Oaktec Honda Insight Hybrid rally car used E85 bio-ethanol fuel for the first time.

The car, which has support from Motorsport Development UK through the Energy Efficient Motorsport programme, was crewed by Oaktec partners Paul Andrews and Bill Meeson, and made the historic move of running on bio-ethanol while competing on the Centenary Rally, in Class A of the Formula 1000 Rally Championship.

The one litre car uses a V-TEC three-cylinder engine with an electric motor/generator built into the flywheel, which boosts performance under acceleration and converts wasted braking energy into electricity which is then stored in a 22kg battery pack.

The team has been testing a development Insight with E85, and was comfortable with the performance and reliability of the fuel, but elected to only use it for the final two stages of the six stage event.

"The car ran faultlessly throughout the event and the ethanol fuel gave us no noticeable drop in performance,” driver and engineer Andrews said. “The use of this fuel completes the green circle and gives us what we believe is the ultimate environmentally responsible rally car.

"Despite the car retaining all the technology that gives it low emission vehicle status, it has excellent straight line performance and only struggled on this event with the roughness of the stages for what was originally built as a car for smooth tarmac roads."

Despite the rough ground, the Insight finished in 29th position overall and sixth in F1000 and now leads Class A in the series. The team is about to embark on an extensive development programme to exploit the characteristics of the Hybrid systems for rallying and other motorsport applications and to get the best output from the E85 fuel, which is becoming increasingly available on UK forecourts.