NASCAR loves corn. Or, more specifically, the organization loves what corn can make – ethanol. Since 2011, drivers moved away from leaded fuel in favor of Sunoco Green E15, blended with U.S.-grown ethanol.
Ryan Welsh, director of sales and marketing at Growth Energy, says the biofuel is a greener, higher-performance option.
“Promoting ethanol is incredibly important from an environmental standpoint,” he says. “Ethanol is a clean-burning, earth-friendly alternative to fossil fuels and it cuts carbon emissions by 34%, which is the equivalent of taking 124 million cars off the road. NASCAR lowered their emissions by 20% by changing to a fuel with a 15% ethanol blend.”
Driver Austin Dillon explains why he’s a fan of ethanol.
“I think the best thing about American Ethanol is we can prove the performance on the track,” he says. “That’s why it relates so well to what we’re doing here in NASCAR. We’re putting a lot of miles on it. Hard miles. Durable miles. When you can go out and run in a race car, there’s no doubt it will be a proven product in a street car.”
As a part of its most recent marketing efforts, NASCAR even released a promotional video professing its love for American ethanol in recognition of NASCAR racers driving 10 million miles using this fuel.
“American home-grown ethanol is a part of our daily lives,” the video proclaims in part. “It’s renewable, domestic, and burns cleaner.”
Other NASCAR Green initiatives include a recycling and waste diversion effort, a tree-planting program in collaboration with the Arbor Day Foundation, and a push for tracks that rely on solar power that currently include Daytona International Speedway and Indianapolis Motor Speedway. For more details, visit http://green.nascar.com/.
