Cyprus racers show budget Solar cars have a sunny future

Venetia Chrysostomide fastened her helmet and rolled her Solar-powered car into the sunny streets of Cypriot capital Nicosia for a race to showcase such vehicles' eco-friendly potential, even on a budget.

The 16-year-old's 5,000-euro (nearly $5,700) car is one of that took part in Sunday's three-hour "Cyprus Institute Solar Car Challenge", running solely on the Mediterranean island's most plentiful resource: sunshine.

Many of the drivers were highschool students, including Chrysostomide, a maths and physics enthusiast from the nearby village of Dali.

"With Solar cars we take energy from the sun, so we can use this to reduce fuel consumption and air pollution."

Her car was made up of parts from two mountain bikes, a metal frame and four Solar panels, connected to batteries.

Tassos Falas, a teacher at her school, spent weeks working in his garage with colleague Anthoulis Hadjitali and mechanic Simos Markitanis to put together the car, capable of hitting 80 kilometres (50 miles) per hour.

Race organiser Aristides Bonanos, from the Cyprus Institute research centre, said participants had spent an average of just 8,000 euros on their vehicles.

That is in contrast to the hundreds of thousands spent on vehicles in the world's biggest Solar races -- Australia's gruelling 3,000 kilometre (1,800 mile) World Solar Challenge.

"When we first started the race we had the idea that there should be something where everyone can participate, so we limited the cost of our vehicles to 20,000 euros," Bonanos said.

The goal is "to make the broader public more aware (that building a Solar car is) something that is fairly easy and fairly cheap to do."

Suited for island life

Yet Solar-powered vehicles could be particularly suited to places like the Mediterranean holiday hotspot.

But Falas dreams that one day his car could become an everyday part of his life.

"Cyprus is a small island, maximum distances are about 150 to 200 kilometres", well within the ranges of the cars competing in the Nicosia race, Bonanos said.

Similar reasoning has encouraged other islands to promote Solar-powered transportation.

The French island of Belle-Ile-en-Mer, on the Bay of Biscay, is set to launch a car-sharing service later this year, with vehicles powered by excess energy from Solar panels on the roofs of public buildings.

But Falas dreams that one day his car could become an everyday part of his life.

"I would love to be allowed to go to work with my car," he said.

"I would park it in the sun in the parking lot of the high school, it will be fully charged by the end of the day and I would go back home, go and do some shopping without spending any money on fuel."

Agence France-Presse