Ford says it is ready to help Santa Claus go green, slashing his carbon footprint with a concept sleigh design powered by a new 1.0-litre EcoBoost engine.
Santa's new ride, packed with Ford technology, would allow Rudolph and friends to enjoy a well-deserved retirement, while Santa makes his annual deliveries saving 191,843 tonnes of CO2 and ?110 million on fuel costs.
"They may look cute, but Santa's team of nine reindeer create a staggering 214,670 tons of CO2 equivalent emissions each year, so something had to be done to help him re-discover his greener roots," comments Ford car designer Paul Wraith.
The benefits of switching to the concept sleigh go beyond the environmental, though. Travelling such huge distances ? some 200,237,360km ? means Santa currently spends in excess of ?122 million on carrots alone to fuel his reindeer.
The impressive fuel efficiency of the 1 litre EcoBoost would reduce Santa's fuel costs by 90% to just ?12 million.
While Santa himself is understandably unavailable for comment, Mrs Claus states: "I am not looking forward to telling Donner and Blitzen the news, but the polar bears in the North Pole will certainly welcome the Ford EcoBoost-powered sleigh."
And she adds: "l would, of course, back anything that means my husband can get home that bit quicker. Getting presents in a shorter amount of time to all the good children each year may even give him time to reconsider a few names on the naughty list. But I can't promise."
Innovative engineering means the new EcoBoost engine delivers performance to rival a traditional 1.6-litre engine but with significantly improved fuel efficiency and lower CO2 emissions of just 114g/km CO2.
The 1.0-litre EcoBoost cylinder block also fits onto a single sheet of A4 paper, but still delivers up to 125PS and 170Nm peak torque, with 200Nm overboost, giving it the highest power density of any Ford production engine to date.
"Our tongue may be firmly in cheek as we launch this sleigh design, but our heart is in the right place," says Wraith. "At Ford, we're dreaming of a green Christmas. We're already thinking of the concept sleigh mark II. With electric vehicle battery technology developing all the time, we are keen to get to work on a zero-carbon version of our sleigh."
Highlights of Ford's technology in the new sleigh include:
Active park assist: technology that first checks if a parking space is big enough, then automatically steers your sleigh into it. Useful for Santa in making those tight reverse rooftop landings.
Door edge protector: a simple, but ingenious addition to Ford doors, helping thwart dents, dings and scratches even in the tightest parking spot. Vital to help Santa stop scratching the door of his sleigh on all those chimneys.
SYNC: in-van, voice-activated technology that will help Santa keep in touch with the elves back at base, stay en route with GPS navigation and enable him to listen to and change his favourite Christmas music.
EcoMode: in-van software that provides useful advice for drivers on achieving better fuel economy tailored to their individual driving styles. A specially modified version of the software will include an electronic Christmas tree image. The better Santa's green driving performance, the more of the trees branch symbols will light-up.
Active City Stop & Blind Spot Information System: two driver assistance technologies, the first detecting if the vehicle in front unexpectedly stops and braking automatically in response; the second helps detecting vehicles in blind spots during normal driving. Both will be useful to Santa, as he tries to avoid planes in our increasingly crowded skies.
MyKey: enabling Santa to encourage his elves to drive more safely and fuel efficiently, with increased safety-belt usage, through a range of driver specific configurable features.
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