In the fall of 2003, the boy band TOKIO embarked from Tokyo on a journey to cover the entire coastline of Japan in a 1997 Daihatsu Hijet minivan that they had refit themselves with a solar roof-panel and a battery-powered engine. Driving in shifts of two, the five members have, as of the most recent installment of their TV show "Tetsuwan Dash," traveled along the coast of the Tohoku region, Hokkaido, the entire Japan Sea, Kyushu, Okinawa, Shikoku, Chubu and Kansai for a total of 15,603 km. The vehicle, which is called Dankichi, is now somewhere in Mie Prefecture.
Each episode of their trip ends when the battery runs down after sunset. The practical limits of a solar-powered car are clear, but the fact that they've made it this far and required servicing only once is nevertheless impressive. When we talk about alternative vehicles we talk about using ethanol, electricity or hydrogen, all of which require energy to produce in the first place. At present, solar cars may be impractical for many of the things we use cars for, but they are almost completely self-sufficient.
Like Dankichi, solar cars in general are looked upon as little more than novelties and thus unworthy of the attention of major automobile makers. Until recently, oil prices were so low that car companies didn't have to think about new types of vehicles, but everyone has now reached the conclusion that those days are gone and won't be back again. With the controversy over "peak oil" — the theory that all underground petroleum reserves will soon be tapped — and the inescapable dangers of greenhouse gases, ecological countermeasures are imperative. But since even China defers to the market these days, solutions are being driven by economics. A recent article in the Asahi Shimbun said that as a reaction to the late 1970s oil crisis, more than 800,000 solar-heating units were installed in Japanese homes during the 1980s. As the oil crisis abated and energy prices dropped, sales of solar units dipped.