Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel have backed Formula 1’s ambition to have a net-zero carbon footprint by 2030, believing the sport is right to want to drive change.
Formula 1 last week unveiled its long-term plan to help tackle climate change, which includes all grands prix becoming sustainable before 2025.
Hamilton had previously spoken of his desire to try and live a more environmentally-friendlier lifestyle, and supports Formula 1’s changes.
“I think anything is possible as long as the intent…they mean it,” said Hamilton.
“And you just have to put your mind to it, the investment. It is not like they have got a lack of money to make the changes, I think the teams have to also be willing to participate.
“I know my team is, I know Mercedes is, I have not heard or read about Ferrari or any of the other teams particularly but maybe they are also with it, but they need to be on the same journey because it is going to take the whole of the sport to make a change.
“It is about being really strict and it is about when you go to all these different countries, particularly the new ones they are bringing onto the circuit, it is super easy for them to implement already because in the contracts you can say from day one this is what is going to be a sustainable weekends, for the other one they have plenty of time to make change particularly for the end of the following years, so I don’t see why it won’t happen.
“But I definitely am open to working with Chase [Carey] and with his team and with the FIA, I’ve already emailed, I’ve been talking to Chase for nearly two/three years and saying we have to do something together, we have not yet quite figured out what that role is, but it is something in that area.”
On the long-term ambitions, Vettel said: “I think it’s a great message and it’s about time. So it’s good to see that people who can make decisions and can make change are thinking of making change.
“I think it’s an ambitious target. Equally I would like to see a lot of the goals that are set out to be achieved sooner because I think it is a must in our times and we can’t afford to wait.
“So I think it’s definitely going in the right direction. I don’t think we need to be hiding.
“Obviously the sport that we love is called motorsport because we have an engine in our car so it comes with some, may be some things that people jump on and would like to criticise and say it’s all a fraud.
“But I think in general we should not try and highlight the things that may be people are not doing or that you should do differently.
“I think we should focus on things which we can actually do differently in order to make a change. This is both for every individual but also for us as a sport.
“So I think the challenge is quite clear, it’s to obviously improve our sport, enhance the show, grow passion based on the values that we share for such a long time but make them sustainable so I think that is an incredible challenge but as I said it’s about time.”
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