Over the weekend, Nissan unveiled its ZEOD RC (Zero Emission On Demand Racing Car) at Le Mans, in the public area of the Circuit de la Sarthe. The vehicle is only due to take part in next year's Le Mans 24 Hours, where it will compete as part of the Automobile Club de l'Ouest's Garage 56, which is an additional spot reserved for experimental vehicles.
The company says that since current battery technology doesn't provide the energy storage capacity to race a solely electric Le Mans prototype, the ZEOD RC programme will attempt to develop multiple technologies to evaluate how they can be used for a future LM P1 class return of Nissan at Le Mans. This will include a Zero Emission on Demand option switching between electric and petrol-powered drive.
The next twelve months will be spent evaluating multiple drive train options, and the ZEOD RC is slated to make its testing debut later this summer. Nissan is also set to work together with Michelin to produce tires for the new prototype.
The design team will be headed by Ben Bowlby, the company's newly-appointed Director of Motorsport Innovation, who previously worked on the Nissan DeltaWing program in 2012.
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