As his engineers tinkered away with the car parked in the tent just behind him, the former Formula One world champion Nico Rosberg looked down the mud-splattered paddock and said: “For all sports in the world, this is the direction we need to go in.”

Rosberg, now a full-on sustainability entrepreneur since hanging up his racing gloves, was back competing, albeit this time as founder and chief executive of RXR racing. “This is the first motorsport ever to be built on a social cause. We are a global role model for sport.”

His new role has brought him to deepest Dorset in the middle of winter for the final race in the inaugural season of the innovative Extreme E championship, an FIA-sanctioned series for electric off-road SUVs.

This new concept of racing is designed to shine the spotlight on the climate crisis by holding races in remote parts of the world affected. After events in Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Greenland and Sardinia, the season should have ended in Patagonia but for pandemic reasons it’s being held at Bovington Army camp on the south coast of England. This race has been named the Jurassic X-Prix, certainly not a reference to any dinosaurs, more a nod to the famous coastline nearby.

Just a few tents down from Rosberg’s was the car belonging to a very familiar foe and the only one that could stop him from lifting this year’s title – the purple liveried X44 team, formed by Sir Lewis Hamilton. “How cool is this?” the German said. “Not only are we fighting for a championship, we’re also in it for a good cause. The more intense our battle, the more impact we’ll have, the more awareness we can raise – that’s amazing.”

All weekend, much like the rest of the season, the two teams had dominated, going head to head down to the final lap of the season (stop me if you’ve heard this one before). In the end the X44 car was by far the strongest on this course, driven by Cristina Gutiérrez of Spain and the seven-time world rally champion Sébastien Loeb of France. It put them level on points with RXR, who finished fourth here, but Rosberg’s team claimed the title by having more race victories. Agony for Hamilton’s team (again).

The paddock was full of motorsport celebrities. Jenson Button was there, in charge of his team JBXE, while the former rally world champions Carlos Sainz and Loeb were both driving. Jutta Kleinschmidt, the first female Dakar Rally winner, was there too, as was Jamie Chadwick, the first winner of the all-female W Series in 2019, who followed up with victory again this year.

This is because gender equality also plays a major part in Extreme E’s philosophy. Unique in the world of motorsport, each team has to field one male and one female driver, with equal roles to both. Catie Munnings, the 24‑year‑old British driver for the Andretti United team, only made her debut in the world rally championship last year but this year she has been racing against heroes such as Loeb. She is the unofficial face of Extreme E and even represented them at the recent Cop26 in Glasgow.

Button is fully behind the mixed‑gender racing of Extreme E. “Motorsport has been a male‑dominated sport for decades,” he said. “But this brings a lot of awareness to female drivers, which is great. It means we’re going to see more girls at a young age get interested and that will filter up.”

Each of the nine teams has one car, a fully electric SUV named Odyssey 21. These futuristic machines are nearly identical, the only alterations the teams are allowed to make are with the bodywork. The batteries have been developed by Williams Advanced Engineering, designed to withstand the extreme temperatures, conditions and terrains. They can produce a maximum power output of 470kW (equivalent to approximately 630bhp) enough to project the 1,780kg SUV from 0-62mph in 4.5 seconds at gradients of up to 130%.

To power up the batteries, Extreme E is using pioneering hydrogen fuel cell technology which will enable its race fleet to be charged using zero emission energy. This innovative, off-grid solution from AFC Energy uses water and sun to generate hydrogen power. Not only does this process emit no greenhouse emissions, its only byproduct is water, which is utilised elsewhere on site.

The racing for this X-Prix was held over three days, rather than two for the others, due to the shortage of daylight, with two sets of qualifying on the first two days followed by semi-finals and then a five‑car final on the Sunday. There was also a “crazy race” thrown into the mix, a kind of repechage, in which the slowest qualifiers vie with each other to win the last spot in the final. Every race consists of three laps of the 3.8km circuit: two laps by one driver then a quick changeover in a designated “switch zone” before one lap by the other.

It’s fast, furious and futuristic. The defining feature of the course is the 5.4metre “knife edge” jump, which features a 23‑degree slope, making the cars airborne. The noise from the cars is a mix of electric screeching, much a like a pig squealing, and the clatter of stones sent flying.

One of the key components to Extreme E’s global adventure is docked in Poole harbour for the duration of this round. Instead of using carbon-heavy air freight to transport all the kit for the championship around the globe, the organisers transformed the former Royal Mail ship, St Helena, which had been serving in the South Atlantic for 26 years. She isn’t fully electric yet, as she proclaims in bold down the side of her hull, instead running on a low-sulphur marine diesel, known as “champagne” in the industry.

At every venue for an X-Prix this season Extreme E’s scientific committee has selected a legacy project, a chance to highlight and provide help with a local environmental issue. In 2022 the National Trust is hoping to reintroduce beavers for the first time in 400 years to the Little Sea area near Studland, in the wetlands at the heart of its dune system. Wetlands are particularly vulnerable areas when it comes to changes in climate and biodiversity, but beavers act as nature’s water engineers.

This weekend’s final race was held in front of no spectators, just a small gathering of sponsors witnessing the action. This was a decision by the organisers to keep fans away and reduce the carbon footprint their attendance produces.

As soon as the race had finished in Dorset, the usual motor-racing rituals had to be played out. Then, once all the champagne had been sprayed and post-race interviews completed, Rosberg and his two ecstatic drivers jumped into the quagmire together and rolled around with delight.