Pennsylvania's Pocono Raceway, which hosts two NASCAR events each year, plans to build a three megawatt solar power plant to provide the track with electricity.At three megawatts, it would be the world's biggest solar energy project at a sports facility, and Pennsylvania's largest to date (at least two other 3 mW farms in PA are in earlier stages of development).
The plan is to place about 40,000 photovoltaic panels on a 25-acre former parking lot next to the raceway. A ribbon cutting ceremony was held Friday, before the Sunoco Red Cross Pennsylvania 500. The solar farm should be completed by Spring 2010, according to Pocono Raceway's president, Brandon Igdalsky.
According to an article in The New York Times sports section, other sports sites that use solar energy include: Taiwan's National Stadium, AT&T Park in San Francisco, Progressive Field in Cleveland and the Stade de Suisse Wankdorf in Bern, Switzerland. London is building a wind turbine to help power the 2012 Olympic games.
Pocono's decision is a green publicity boon for NASCAR, a sport not traditionally associated with clean technology.
For years, environmentalists needled the racing organization about its use of leaded gas (auto racing is exempt from certain clean-air laws), and in 2006, after extensive testing, NASCAR announced it would begin using unleaded fuel by 2008.
Indy race cars, meanwhile, began using 100% ethanol-based fuel in 2008.
SOURCE : REUTERS
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