TotalEnergies and the WEC

TotalEnergies is the official fuel supplier for the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC) and for the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

TotalEnergies is therefore actively involved in the return of Peugeot Sport to the WEC from last year in the new Hypercar category. The company, via the Elf brand, is equally a partner of Alpine, which returned to LMP2 this year, before entering the Hypercar category in 2024

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2VkpJQhdlE&ab_channel=TotalEnergiesxRacing

Major partnership with Automobile Club de l’Ouest (ACO)

The ACO has recently redefined the rules for the WEC, introducing stricter constraints for the Hypercar category. Now, the objective is to achieve the best performance while minimising fuel consumption. This revolution reflects the current concerns of both manufacturers and motorists: consuming less and reducing their environmental footprint.

To meet these requirements, and following the Excellium Endurance which contained 10% ethanol from renewable sources (plant waste) and 5% of bio-hydrocarbons, our engineers have created after several months of research and testing, a formula that no longer contains a single drop of petrol: Excellium Racing 100.

Excellium Racing 100 emerged from this drive to combine performance and efficiency. This fuel from 100% certified* sustainable fuel sources has made its debut in March 2022, in the season opener of the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC), the 1,000 Miles of Sebring. Designed and manufactured by TotalEnergies, Excellium Racing 100 is made from bioethanol, itself produced from waste from French vineyards.

Due to its 100% natural origin, Excellium Racing 100 will reduce greenhouse gas emissions from cars on the track by at least 65%**.

Excellium Racing 100 is a true innovation made possible by our engineers’ expertise, and ties into the common values that the company shares with the FIA, namely safety, hybridisation, reduced consumption, low-carbon mobility, etc. As partner and official fuel supplier to the ACO (Automobile Club de l’Ouest), TotalEnergies is again proving its pioneering spirit and quest for performance.

This new fuel, approved by all our stakeholders thanks to the testing phases and discussions with constructors and legislators (FIA, ACO), is now supplied to all competitors in the FIA WEC, including for the 24 Hours of Le Mans and European Le Mans Series.

Peugeot and TotalEnergies develop a Le Mans Hypercar

Peugeot and TotalEnergies marked twenty-five years of working together in 2020 by officially launching their joint Le Mans Hypercar (LMH) project. An ambitious programme that has led to a works entry in the World Endurance Championship from the 6 hours of Monza. Deeply rooted in the DNA of both brands, racing has always provided unrivalled opportunities for technological development.

Le Mans Hypercar, Endurance racing’s new top-tier category, embodies perfectly the energy transition of both companies and especially that undertaken by TotalEnergies, which has now become a multi-energy company able to meet all mobility demands.

Alpine returned to the top-tier category with elf

Forty-three years after the Alpine A442b claimed overall victory at the 24 Hours of Le Mans, Alpine returned to Endurance racing’s top-tier category in 2021. It’s supported once again by Elf, its longstanding sporting partner, as it embarked on this new challenge. The arrival of Alpine Elf Endurance Team in the new Hypercar category with the Alpine A480 was the logical next step after claiming two FIA WEC LMP2 World Championship titles in 2016 and 2019 and winning the 24 Hours of Le Mans three times in the last five years in the feeder category to the top tier.

With the Frenchman Nicolas Lapierre, third overall at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 2014, the Brazilian André Négrao, and the Frenchman Matthieu Vaxivière, Alpine Elf Endurance Team achieved two strong seasons, clinching two pole, two wins (1000 miles of Sebring 2022, 6 Hours of Monza 2022) and eleven podiums including a hard fought third place at the 24 Hours of Le Mans 2021. These results enabled them to finish runner-up in both the drivers and manufacturer world championship standings in 2022. The team will rejoin the LMP2 category in 2023, entering two Alpine A470 (Matthieu Vaxiviere, Julien Canal, Charles Milesi and André Negrão, Memo Rojas, Olli Caldwell), while developing its Hypercar LMDh for 2024.

The 24 Hours of Le Mans, a legendary race

The main event of the FIA WEC season, the 24 Hours of Le Mans is one of the world’s most extreme and demanding races for the cars taking part.

The 24 Hours of Le Mans is equally a huge challenge for the people involved. TotalEnergies teams are no exception to this rule, distributing some 280,000 litres of fuel to the 62 cars taking part. In the interests of sporting equity, at the request of the ACO and the FIA, they also conduct more than 150 fuel compliance tests in the pit garages of the various competitors. They conduct the tests using a chromatography device, which checks the fuel’s “digital fingerprint”. Our fuel is controlled at each manufacturing step in order to ensure high quality and to warrant fairness to all competitors. To do so, a TotalEnergies engineer is on the track to check the fuel, at all time.

More than 150 tests conducted during the 24h of Le Mans to check fuel compliance of the competitors.

*Excellium Racing 100 is a certified 100% sustainable product according to the mass balance system applied by a voluntary certification organisation approved by the European Union.

**In line with the methodology provided by the European RED II directive (2018/2001), Excellium Racing 100 can reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least 65% compared to its fossil equivalent.