Antarctica: leveraging technology to protect fragile ecosystems

“Until now, researchers have had to get around on foot in some areas, in order to avoid polluting them,” explains Venturi President Gildo Pastor. “Now, with the Venturi Antarctica, they will have access to an efficient, very manoeuvrable vehicle with excellent traction. Scientists will be able to carry out their research under optimum conditions, without polluting these sites where analysis requires molecular precision.”

The Antarctica is an electric vehicle with wheel-mounted caterpillar tracks. Offering 2x60kW power and weighing in at around 2 tonnes, it can carry three people, as well as luggage and equipment. It has a range of approximately 50 kilometres and a speed of 25 kilometres per hour in realistic operating conditions.

The Back to Telegraph Creek expedition is one of the Venturi Global Challenges, missions organised by Venturi Automobiles to test the company’s electric vehicles in the most extreme conditions and most challenging terrains on the planet.

It follows in the footsteps of the Croisière Blanche, an expedition conceived in the early 1930s by French car manufacturer Citroën. That attempt to cross north-western Canada was not successful at the time due to disastrous weather conditions. Thanks to Venturi technology, the mission has now been accomplished.

Since 2021, the Venturi Antarctica is in service at the Princess Elisabeth Antarctica station. This is a world first: never before has an electric vehicle with caterpillar tracks operated on the hostile White Continent. It has enabled several scientific missions to be carried out on the ground, including maintenance work on several automated weather observation stations, snow surface temperature measurements and satellite measurements validation. In addition, this new version of the Venturi Antarctica enabled a simulated emergency rescue to be carried out, based on the scenario of extracting someone from the bottom of a crevasse.