The uncomfortable dilemma resulting from F1's constant expansion

Although fans generally shudder when they see the S-word connected with Formula 1, they're going to have to get used to it. Motor racing's highest echelon is predicated on pitting the drivers of the fastest and most advanced motor cars against one another on a global stage, but it's also a business.

And businesses increasingly need to demonstrate social and environmental responsibility. Corporate sponsors and investors no longer wish to be associated with profligacy and the plundering of 
the earth's resources.

Squaring sustainability with F1's competitive essence is a huge challenge, and one to which the stakeholders are rising. F1 recently published an update on its mission to become net carbon zero by 2030, a target first announced in November 2019. While much of the document was devoted to reiterating the key points of the plan, there was evidence of progress despite the disruption wrought by the COVID-19 pandemic.

F1 has renegotiated its energy-supply contracts so it receives all its energy from 100% renewable sources, and has reorganised the logistics of its broadcast operations to eliminate 70 tonnes of freight from each race.

The teams are also making progress. Mercedes has achieved the FIA's Three-Star Environmental Accreditation standard, and McLaren was the first to achieve carbon-neutral certification - a decade ago. But the standards grow ever tighter, and recertification is required every five years.

"We are fully integrated in F1's programme, in parallel to the programmes we're running," says team principal Andreas Seidl. "Topics like plastic bottles, wasted food we produce and so on, is something we put a lot of focus on. We welcome all these initiatives, and at the same time try to support them because it's a necessity going forward."

Red Bull has also announced a 'No Bull' drive which aims to achieve net carbon neutral status for the 2020 season and reduce CO2 emissions by 5000 tonnes during 2021. Drawing up the plan required a comprehensive audit of the team's activities and the recognition that operating the cars on track represents just a fraction of its carbon emissions. Facilities, travel and transport amount to 93%.

Changing power tariffs, reorganising factory operations, rethinking travel arrangements and reducing single use-plastics are among the measures Red Bull is taking. Alongside that is a partnership with the Swiss-based Gold Standard Foundation, an organisation which enables companies to responsibly offset "unavoidable" emissions.

"We believe that there will be several routes to a lower carbon automotive industry, and we want to be associated with one we think will not just have a major impact positively on the automotive industry, but also will support our objectives as a sport" Yath Gangakumaran

As governments draw up plans to phase out sales of cars powered by internal combustion engines (ICEs), F1 has a philosophical decision to make. Like it or not, the era of fossil fuels is drawing to a close. If in doubt, follow the money: nations which grew rich through the exploitation of resources beneath their soil are now diversifying with extraordinary haste.

But the ICE is destined to remain at the heart of F1 for the foreseeable future, regardless of what other initiatives the participants, the FIA and the commercial rights holder may take to embrace greater sustainability within their businesses.

"We're doubling down on hybrids," said F1's director of strategy and business development, Yath Gangakumaran, in a recent podcast for Motorsport Network's Thinking Forward series.

"We believe that there will be several routes to a lower carbon automotive industry, and we want to be associated with one we think will not just have a major impact positively on the automotive industry, but also will support our objectives as a sport.

"Everyone's talking about electric and hydrogen. And we have looked into that, as part of our next-generation engine, which will come in in five years' time. But they really don't have the performance characteristics we need as the pinnacle of motorsport, to allow our cars to go at the speeds we want and the distances we require."

PLUS: The development obstacles F1's power roadmap has to clear

F1 is betting on biofuels, reckoning that second-generation fuels of this ilk, particularly synthetic ones, will eliminate the disadvantages associated with the first. Once seen as a silver-bullet solution to the issues stemming from fossil fuels, biofuels have baggage of their own: growing the feedstock requires land which might otherwise be used for agriculture, potentially contributing to food poverty, as well as causing ecological damage such as deforestation when land is converted. Pollution from pesticide run-off is also among the portfolio of negatives.

Synthetic biofuels would potentially reduce the number of demerits while appealing to a car industry - and its customers - contemplating how existing vehicles might be fuelled once new ICE-powered ones are legislated out of existence. But will these fuels arrive in time to carry F1's big bet?