Aurora 101 Looking for Brazilian Sunshine

Bibendum, the historic ‘Michelin Man’ will be out and about in Rio de Janeiro late May as Michelin stages another spectacular showcase event for the advanced technology cars of the world.

First scheduled to take place a year ago it was delayed because of the GFC but is back on track bigger than ever in Brazil. That is Brazil the world leader in the adoption of alcohol-based fuels.

The Aurora Vehicle Association, a volunteer group from Melbourne Australia will be there to demonstrate its outstanding solar car ‘Aurora 101’. This will be an impressive icon of a vehicle that produces no emissions, uses no fuel and is powered just by sunlight. The audience for such a demonstration will be 500 members of the international media.

It is expected that over 300 vehicles will be on display and available for drive demonstrations to the media audience. Aurora will be the sole Australian entrant.

Backed by Mazda, CSIRO, Minter Ellison, Sumitomo Michelin and RACV the solar car has been chosen to lead the main event of Bibendum, a 300 km journey in the mountains inland from Rio de Janeiro.

Aurora attended Bibendum for the first time in 2004 when it was staged around the amazing Formula One track in Shanghai. Notably the aurora solar car completed the Rally with more energy in the battery than when it started. It had been a sunny day.

Maybe a 14 week round trip in a shipping container is a long way to go for a 300 km drive in the country, but maybe we will see the Michelin Man samba! Now that’s worth seeing.

Watch for our daily reports from Rio commencing 29 May and get a feel for this showcase of advanced technology.