Cleaner fuels, customised toilets among efforts for greener F1 Singapore Grand Prix

The Formula One Singapore Grand Prix (GP) will be using cleaner fuels this year as part of efforts to halve its existing carbon emissions from energy consumption by 2028.

Energy consumption from lighting up the street circuit and powering different facilities accounted for 96 per cent of its carbon emissions last year, Singapore GP’s first carbon footprint report released on Friday (Sep 8) found.

Transport and waste took up only a small fraction.

Ahead of the race on Sunday, organisers are actively working towards F1’s sustainability goal of net-zero by 2030, said Singapore GP director of sustainability Sasha Rafi.

To target its biggest culprit, the Singapore GP will trial a cleaner form of renewable fuel made from treated vegetable oil to power its generators.

“We're hoping that with the success in the trial after this year, we can implement this into more generators,” Ms Sasha told CNA.

LED lights which use 30 per cent less energy than traditional lights will power the whole circuit after a successful trial last year.

About 1,500 solar panels that were installed will be able to power the Pit Building for a month.

ENVIRONMENTALLY FRIENDLY TOILETS

The efforts go beyond the track.

Environmentally friendly toilets powered by solar energy will also be available to fans. The solar panels, which can power the lights and air-conditioning in the toilets, can last six to seven hours, which means they can last from sunset to when the gates close, said Singapore GP technical manager David Pang.

Toilets and sinks will be interconnected, so any water used for washing hands will then be reused for flushing, the first time such a concept is being used, he added.

“We designed this and you cannot buy this off the shelf. We sat down with our industry partners to go through how we could better improve the patrons’ experience as well as the usability for these toilets,” he said.

The toilets will save more than 129,000 litres of water, enough to serve a typical household for two years. The event is also saving 160,000 plastic bottles by providing water stations.

Singapore GP will use average per attendee carbon emission as one of its metrics so that regardless of the number of attendees, it can track its improvement over the years, said Ms Sasha.

"We are holding ourselves accountable and not just relying on counting the same sources (of data) as we did in 2022,” she said.

These efforts aside, Singapore GP does not account for carbon footprint beyond its control, such as those incurred by fans from other countries travelling here for the race, although Ms Sasha said it will look at how it can address this issue in the future.

“We will also call upon our fans to suggest to us what are ways that we could improve the event experience for them in a more sustainable way,” she said.

SHOULD SINGAPORE RUN A DAY RACE?

In the near term, holding the F1 race in the day may be the right choice when it comes to reducing carbon footprint, said senior research fellow David Broadstock from the National University of Singapore’s Energy Studies Institute.

“This, by itself, would eliminate an awful lot of energy consumption connected with at least the lighting of the track and very possibly diminish the need for generators quite significantly because you could rely upon solar power much more considerably,” he told CNA.

However, he asked if such drastic measures should be explored.

“There's something interesting about presenting ourselves with the question: ‘How do we continue to move forward in committing to a net-zero trajectory, but not losing sight of the fact that we as humans place a lot of value in conducting, attending iconic sports like this?’”, he said.

He said moving the timing of the race would mean sacrificing the spectacle of the night event.

“In the long term, I would like to hope that we'd be able to move towards a system where we can keep both in balance. That we do the things we as individuals like to enjoy, that we don't sacrifice on everything that gives us quality of life, but are able to achieve all these things in a net-zero fashion in the long term,” he added.

Executive director of sports and wellness at the Singapore Tourism Board Ong Ling Lee said that being the first to hold a night race gives the city bragging rights.

However, beyond that, there is a need to keep things fresh, she said.

“We always have to be on the lookout for very interesting and engaging experiences. And we have to continue to curate very unique and innovative lifestyle offerings and products that can complement the race,” she told CNA938’s Asia First.

“We do want to set Singapore apart from the other F1 destinations. So we have to keep looking, keep hunting, keep thinking, and keep trying.”