This is the Statt Mann Baby. It’s time to Scatt a little bit.

Last week on Earth Day officials at the private company Formula E Holdings came to Los Angeles to thump the publicity drum for global Formula E racing.

The open-wheel series will make 10 stops around the world in its inaugural year with L.A. expected to host a race in late 2014 or early 2015.

Currently, Miami and L.A. are the only U.S. cities. Others include Rome, London, Rio, Buenos Aires and Beijing.

And these aren’t golf carts by any stretch. The electric motors are putting out more than 320 horsepower and 350 foot pounds of torque. They’ll weigh about sixteen hundred, fifty pounds. McLaren and Dallara are building the cars. It’s expected that four cars will be built for each of ten teams expected to participate.

The plan is for cars to race about 20 to 25 minutes. Then, instead of swapping batteries on a pit stop, the drivers will swap cars and keep going.

On paper it’ll take about seventy minutes to fully recharge the batteries on a specialized electrical circuit.

Obviously this is all in the planning stages. But one can only hope that the series takes the green flag. When it works, racing can be a leader for research and development of automotive technology.

And I don’t know of anything we need more than an alternative to internal combustion power. Maybe one day there’ll be plug & play Funny Cars.

Peace.