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The Greenbird land craft in Lake Lefroy - Australia. August 2008.

General FAQs

Q What is the Greenbird?
A The Greenbird is a British challenge on the land and ice world speed records, using wind power alone.
More about The Greenbird.

Q Who holds the current records, and what are they?
A Land Record - 116.7 mph (188 km/h) - set on 20th March, 1999 in Prim, Nevada (USA) by Bob Schumacher (USA) in 'Iron Duck'. Ice Record - No official record, but it is generally reckoned to be around 80 mph. More about the ice record challenge and the land record challenge.

Q Are you using the same craft for both records?
A No - Due to the different requirements of the surfaces, specialist vehicles are required to cope with the unique properties of each medium. More about the crafts.

Q How do the vehicles work?
A All the crafts rely on solid sails, much like an aircraft wing. Just as airflow over an aircraft's horizontal wing pushes the aircraft up, the flow of air over The Greenbird's vertical sail pushes the vehicles forward. This force, combined with exceptional efficiency, enables the land craft to travel at between 3 & 5 times the real wind speed, depending on the surface traction. More about how they work.

Q When and where will the record attempt take place?
A The next attempt will take place sometime between 15 August and 10 September 2008 on Lake Lefroy salt flats in Western Australia. Lake Lefroy is around one hours flight from Perth and a 1.5 hour’s drive from Kalgoorie, an ex gold-mining town. Testing of the vehicle in Australia will begin on 15th August 2008. More about the land record location.

Q Why is the vehicle called The Greenbird?
A The existing wind-powered land speed record is held by an American, Bob Schumacher. It is our aim to claim this record as a British one. In recognition of this, we have decided to name the vehicle in which we’ll be making the attempt The Greenbird - a nod to Donald Campbell, the last British world record holder in his craft the Bluebird. Donald achieved incredible speeds in a golden age of fossil fuels - when oil was cheap and no one had thought that one day it would run out. Fast forward to today and we are coming to the end of the age of fossil fuels and the dawn of the age of Renewables. The Greenbird symbolises this historical watershed better than anything else. Cars of the future won’t be running on fossil fuels they will be running on Renewable sources of energy like the Wind. And with today’s technology we can achieve incredible speeds, using only wind power.

Q Why is the attempt taking place in Australia?
A After many years of testing in the deserts of North America (the other famous location for landsailing), Lake Lefroy was chosen for its reliable wind, huge expanse of open, natural surface and high traction. It provides the best chance for a successful record challenge. More about the land record location.

Q Will you be carbon offsetting your travel to and from Australia?
A One in six of all wind projects in England today were planned and built by Ecotricity. Or, looking at in another way, Ecotricity now produces more than 12 per cent of England’s wind energy.

We feel that the contribution made to the development of wind technologies via the record attempt, far outweighs the carbon produced in transportation of the vehicle and the team. The Greenbird itself will be shipped to Australia, reducing its carbon footprint significantly.

Q Why the sails are so differently shaped (ice craft v. land craft)?
A The sail shape and area is dictated by the amount of 'grip' you have on the surface underneath and the required acceleration.

On land (salt flats), the traction is low and we have a relatively large area in which to sail. This dictates a small (tall and skinny) highly efficient sail, which gives a higher top speed although poor acceleration. As we are only concerned about top speed and we have a large area, acceleration is not important on salt.

On ice, we have significantly greater traction (against slipping sideways) but a smaller area in which to sail. This means we need more power at slower speeds (bigger sail) to increase acceleration. As long as we can maintain grip at high speeds, the larger area should not affect the top speed. More on how it works.

Q How do you decide daily whether to go for the record? And once conditions are favourable, what is actually involved with setting up and doing it?
A We will set up the vehicle on the lake in early August. It takes about a day to assemble the vehicle and get all the settings and tolerances correct. After initial trials, if everything works well, we will declare that we are on 'official record standby'. This means that the vehicle is record condition and awaiting suitable weather conditions to challenge the record.

See more on the land record location and our blog.

Q How is the speed and record attempt actually recorded?
A The speed is recorded with high accuracy, on board GPS (global positioning system). We have a minimum of 4 separate systems on board, each recording the speed and position of the vehicle, up to 10 times per second. At least one system will be provided by the official measurers who will be present. These measurers, or time keepers, are from the North American Land Sailing Association, which is responsible for measurement of land sailing speed records.

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