The world's fastest car could be powered by electricity within the next two years.

A Sussex-based racing car specialist has designed a revolutionary vehicle using electricity and gas turbine power to challenge the wheel-driven land spped record.

Martin Bryant worked as a racing car designer and race engineer for top industry names such as Williams, Ligier and Arrows Formula 1 teams.

He set up Podium Designs in Haywards Heath in 1997 to concentrate on developing his car of the future and has made a personal investment of £250,000 to build the Pegasus.

The concept, along with a replica one-sixth of the final car's size, was officially launched to the public at the Brands Hatch Classic Festival in Kent on Sunday.

Mr Bryant said: "We have been researching the project for more than two and a half years and we are ready to share what it is capable of.

"The ultimate land speed record is currently held by Thrust, a jet engine car powered like an aircraft or a rocket. It travelled through the sound barrier in 1997 to reach 763 mph. There is not much more can be achieved using conventional technology and we aim to challenge many existing speed records because we have been working with a very different system."

The new approach is to turn away from fuel-hungry power machines to create an electric car with low/zero emissions. The wheels are turned by electric motors, powered by electricity generated from a system of batteries and a low-emissions gas turbine running on clean fuels, such as natural gas or LPG (liquid petroleum gas). Light-weight carbon composite materials will be used for the chassis to boost speed and structural integrity.

Pegasus begins test runs in the autumn. The wheel-driven land speed record stands at just below 410 mph, set in 1965 by the American team Goldenrod and the world electric speed record is currently a comparatively slow 245 mph.

A British car driven by John Cobb notched up a wheel driven land speed record of 394 mph in 1947.

Mr Bryant said: "We plan to build two vehicles in our bid to beat the records. The first one will be ready by the autumn and we will aim to reach 500 mph with this design. We will use our experiences with the first vehicle to iron out any design issues and rebuild the car over the winter ready for the main record challenge in 2002 and 500mph-plus."

A full-size version of the Pegasus will be displayed for the first time at Airbourne 2001 in Eastbourne in August. Latest news about the project will be on the Pegasus web site, created by Southwick-based E-Advantage Solutions.

www.greenspeedrecord.com