Renault's all-electric sport cars will be racing in the heart of Paris this weekend as part of the FIA Formula E Championship. The Renault e.dams team is the current leader of the team classification and will be looking for a new victory in its home race.
Now in its second season, the FIA Formula E Championship pits electric-powered cars against each other over 11 international races. The Paris leg on April 23 will be hosted over a 1.9km (1.2 mile) circuit around Les Invalides, not far from the Eiffel Tower.
The Renault e.dams team driver Sébastien Buemi is just one point behind leader Lucas di Grassi in the drivers' championship and will be hoping to take back the lead he lost in Long Beach, while his teammate Nicolas Prost will also be aiming for a good performance on home ground.
The all-electric FIA Formula E Championship is seen by Renault as a unique opportunity to implement and test new features, which can then be applied to its electric road cars. The motorsport development cycle is significantly faster than for road cars, and the Renault team has implemented a new architecture for the powertrain, motor and gearbox this season.
FIA Formula E is a prime showcase for electric vehicles. Thanks to noise levels much lower than in Formula 1, races have taken place on the streets of major international cities such as Beijing, Buenos Aires, Berlin and London. Furthermore, the race includes a number of innovations to improve the spectator experience, including a feature called FanBoost, which allows fans to vote for a driver to receive a 30kW power boost during the race.
What’s it like to race a 100% electric car? How different is it from racing a Formula 1 car? Hear what Prost, the son of four-time Formula 1 champion Alain Prost, had to say in this video from the June 2015 TEDGlobal conference in London.
Read our blog post on the topic from 2015 here.
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