The shape of things to come

Coventry Uni students competed to design a radical FCEV supercar that Riversimple will put into production by 2030. STEVE CROPLEY reports

-  STEVE CROPLEY

Pity the emerging generation of car designers. They grow up obsessed like the rest of us, but with the usual desire to drive and own cars overlaid by a burning need to create inspirational designs of their own. When these budding Giugiaros get to university, they put three or four years into learning how to create unique vehicles, yet many will graduate without ever working on a real, live project. For competitive reasons, car companies keep their plans secret, even from future employees.

Which is one vital reason why a new cooperative project between Riversimple, the Wales-based builder of zero-emissions hydrogen fuel cell cars, and a 14-strong group of students at Coventry University's Transport Design school-to propose a new production car - is so special. Riversimple, which already makes its unique Rasa lightweight urban two-seater for subscribers who will never own them, operates so far away from current motor industry norms that it doesn't have formal competitors. Secrecy is less of a problem; publicity is oxygen.

Soon, there's going to be a brand-new Riversimple supercar, the flagship of a new generation of more mainstream hydrogen models from this progressive but idiosyncratic manufacturer. The mantra of its founder, former motorsport engineer and historic car restorer Hugo Spowers, is "to pursue, systematically, the elimination of the environmental impact of personal transport", hence his concentration on hydrogen power, whose only by-product from driving is pure water.