Solar car race finishes in Australia

The 2015 World Solar Challenge solar car race in the Australian outback concluded on Thursday with a team from Delft University in the Netherlands coming in first place.

The race takes place every two years and covers 3,000km (1,800 mile) from Darwin in the Northern Territory to Adelaide in South Australia.

The Nuon Solar Team from Delft University was the first to arrive at the finish line and took five days to compete the race.

The winning Nuna8 car took 37 hours, 56 minutes and 12 seconds of driving, to reach Victoria Square in Adelaide.

Nearly 50 teams from universities and schools around the world competed and it was Delft University’s second consecutive win after winning the last race in 2013.

The World Solar Challenge is designed to promote research & development of solar-powered cars with the aim of bringing them to the consumer market in the future.

The University of Twente, also from the Netherlands, was the runner-up with Japan's Tokai University finishing in third place.

Each car racing in the Challenge is allowed a maximum of 6 sq m of solar panels and the cars are also allowed 5kW hours of stored energy but all other energy must come from the sun or from the kinetic energy of the vehicle.

The Challenge was first run in 1987 and the journey from Darwin to Adelaide goes through the centre of Australia, across deserts where the temperature regularly reaches well over 40°C (104°F).