The Observer

Over six months ago, in the Christmas double issue of Autosport, I wrote: "Sportscar racing, and Le Mans in particular, is a perfect showcase for major manufacturers to market their 'green' progress. It's likely that Formula One will never serve the car giants in this way. Grand Prix racing has been, and continues to be, about glorious excess and ultimate performance."

What do I know?

At Silverstone last weekend, FIA president Max Mosley made it clear that he expects F1's manufacturers to do exactly what I said Grand Prix racing would never touch.

Mosley surprised the F1 paddock by announcing in a press conference regenerative energy power storage systems should be introduced in 2009, ahead of a 'fuel efficiency engine' for 2011. He's talked about it in the past, but the timing of its rise to the top of the agenda was perfect.

It was classic Max Mosley.

The concepts he outlined have thrown another complication into the manufacturers' discussions about homologated engines, due for introduction in 2008. The push to 'go green' will add more debate to the manufacturers' talks as they strive to finalise a compromise to the three-year freeze that Mosley said at Silverstone will be introduced "as published" anyway.

So obviously there are 'political' implications to Mosley's Silverstone statement. But it would be shortsighted to dismiss the president's words as just another tactic in his dealings with the world's biggest car manufacturers.

Max Mosley speaks at the 2006 British Grand Prix © LAT

The statement is also a clear message that the FIA refuses to allow F1 to exist in a bubble. The motor industry is being increasingly forced to face up to its environmental responsibilities - and now, so it seems, is F1.

In short, the regenerative device Mosley would like to see developed would save the energy currently lost under braking, then recycle it to boost acceleration. He talked about a short burst of an extra 60bhp to aid overtaking with a device built from current technology.

Clever. Along with the political ramifications of his statement, Mosley's plan also hits the bases of being environmentally friendly and potentially good for racing.

It doesn't quite tally with my belief that F1 is about "glorious excess", but maybe my mode of thinking is outdated. Actually, there's no maybe about it! I'm officially living in the past!

Still, it's not as if Mosley is suggesting motorsport should be sanitised to the point where it loses its essential ingredients. Racing faces a contradiction it can't avoid in the modern age - and it is walking a tightrope to fit in and yet retain its raw appeal.

At Silverstone Mosley said that "saving fuel, saving energy is absolutely fundamental." Then, almost in the next sentence, he said: "Our only conditions would be that it must be a racing engine as we all understand the term, and the research to improve that racing engine would have to be directly relevant to the research to improve fuel efficiency for road cars."

His words must have struck a chord with the expectant board members of the world's motor manufacturers who sign off the budgets to compete in F1's intense spotlight. Image, perception, success, technical sophistication - that's what matters to them. Going green with cutting-edge technology has got to be good in their eyes, surely.

BMW's motorsport boss Mario Theissen certainly said so at Silverstone: "The regenerative power and the further proposal of new power train systems I would put in one basket. It is an interesting and fascinating approach and we would certainly go for it as a manufacturer because it is about developing innovative technology and that's what we want to do. One just has to be very careful about cost implications."

Thankfully, he added that it should be embraced as long as it didn't dilute F1's essence. "Efficient engines are no bad thing but it needs to be racing and not an economy run," he said. "If you go for fuel efficiency you have to make sure the regulations ensure full racing at all times."

While the FIA has undertaken its own independent study on aerodynamics, which has resulted in the already infamous CDG wing, Mosley has put the emphasis on the manufacturers to drive development on regenerative power. This is F1 working to their benefit, he says.

"This is quite clearly something that is and will be developed for the road and all the major manufacturers are working on different systems at this time," Mosley said at Silverstone. "By allowing it in F1 we will be accelerating its introduction."

But in this age of cost-cutting, it will be expensive, according to the manufacturers. Cosworth's Bernard Ferguson said: "[Regenerative power] is so expensive that Cosworth certainly won't be entering into trying to develop their own solutions. The idea that six manufacturers are all going off independently to spend more than they would on an engine doesn't seem particularly cost-effective."

John Howett of Toyota © LAT

As for the point about technology developed in motorsport benefiting road cars, how realistic is this? It is a subject that is getting harder to quantify.

Toyota's F1 team president John Howett said something at the weekend that supports this. "We use two injectors per cylinder regularly on most road cars, direct and downstream injection in the inlet tract, whereas in F1 we are restricted to a single injector per cylinder," he explained.

"So, actually, one could argue that road car technology is rapidly overtaking F1 technology."

His point is certainly true when it comes to other forms of motorsport. This weekend Audi will attempt to win Le Mans with a turbo-diesel engine. Oil burners have come an awful long way in the motor industry and the market share of diesel road cars is on the increase. But only now is racing technology catching up to allow a diesel to be competitive on the track - and even then only with a significant helping hand from the rule makers.

Racing is following the trend, not setting it - and foremost for marketing reasons rather than technical satisfaction, as with the Audi example.

Likewise, it seems F1's role as the best breeding ground for technical innovation is shrinking fast. Mosley's point that its embracing of regenerative energy devices will speed up development may well be true, but surely the manufacturers would make progress on this with or without F1. It's hardly essential to development.

No, more significantly, the FIA's stance on going green is further evidence that F1 can no longer afford to set its own agenda - at least technically. Beyond the short-term politics of homologation negotiations there is a much more important message for F1.

To survive, it must adapt to a changing world. Whether we like it or not.