this post was submitted on 15 Jan 2024
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In the sense that it uses progressive language, without actually being progressive in action. It's advertised as being socially progressive while racing in Dubai, eco friendly while transporting supplies on oil burning ships, and being innovative despite blocking battery development.
What do you mean by blocking battery development?
Okay, so motorsports have always been considered an innovator in automobile development. Disc brakes, seatbelts, headlights, and anti-lock braking all come from motorsports, and thus the claim put forward by car manufacturers "motorsports innovations make regular driving safer/better" has merit.
In FE, the cars have regulations saying what parts can be modified and improved, and what can't. One of those things that can't be modified on the racecars are the batteries (and powertrains). So no smaller batteries, or more powerful batteries, or different battery casing, or different material components. Every car on the track has been using the same type of 600kw lithium batteries since the beginning of Gen-3 cars.
Manufacturers want to use motorsports as a test bed for trying out new parts and ideas too expensive or risky to put into a production car, so the FIA choosing to block manufacturers from making more efficient batteries for FE means that there's no real innovation going on, despite FE writing the word "innovation" on tons of articles and promotional material.
And what's their argument to block new battery technologies?
Oh nothing. The FIA has actually made promises to open up battery development back during the Gen-2 cars. Manufacturers and fans are still waiting though.
They can't even really claim it's something that would financially affect the teams, since the batteries and powertrains aren't made in-house. They're made by Maserati, Porsche, and Mercedes.
Maybe they don't want Chinese manufacturers showing everyone that they are 20 years ahead on battery technology that everyone else.
The only two possible reasons I can think of are to try and keep on top of costs, and to keep performance of the teams as close as possible.