Speaking at the opening of the Motor Sport Business Forum in Monaco, Max Mosley laid out his vision for the future of F1.

"The biggest element in the new approach to F1 is with the engine," he said. "Full engine freeze is very imminent now. Why are we doing that? The F1 racing engine is fully developed, there is no need to develop an F1 engine any further. The engine runs at 19,000 rpm which is far faster than any comparable engine. It sounds good, it's reliable and amazingly the six partially frozen engines of the current manufacturers are really evenly matched.

"Instead, we will allow manufacturers to spend money on technology which is really useful. The first part of that is the KERS (Kinetic Energy Recovery System) device, which we are introducing in 2009. This is exactly the sort of thing that F1 should be doing because F1 has a need to show that it is useful."

"This is just as important for the Formula One's commercial partners as it is for the manufacturers and technical partners," he continued. "It is necessary to demonstrate to society that F1 is doing something useful because every major sponsor has an environmental impact committee and it is absolutely essential for F1 teams to be able to demonstrate to major companies that they are able to really make a contribution."

Subsequently, Burkhard Göschel, acting chairman of the Formula One Manufacturers Advisory Commission, spoke in favour of the introduction of devices such as KERS, which he believes will put F1 at the leading edge of the car industry.

"Formula One should be road car relevant," he said. "The car industry has a big challenge in improving the efficiency of cars and to reduce CO2. With a move towards more hybrid and eventually electric cars, energy storage is the most important development process which is taking place in the car industry at the moment. F1, with the introduction of Kinetic Energy Recovery Systems (KERS) and heat recovery devices, is therefore at the leading edge."

"Raising engine speed from 19,000 rpm to 20,000 rpm is not relevant for the car industry," he added. "But KERS and heat recovery are relevant and I can tell you that Formula One has made a step to the leading edge of technology. It is driving this process forward."