France Wants To Get Rid of Diesel Fuel

mrspoonsi sends this Reuters report: France wants to gradually phase out the use of diesel fuel for private passenger transport and will put in place a system to identify the most polluting vehicles, Prime Minister Manuel Valls said on Friday. Next year, the government will launch a car identification system that will rank vehicles by the amount of pollution they emit, Valls said in a speech. This will make it possible for local authorities to limit city access for the dirtiest cars. "In France, we have long favoured the diesel engine. This was a mistake, and we will progressively undo that, intelligently and pragmatically," Valls said. About 80 percent of French motorists drive diesel-powered cars. Valls said taxation would have to orient citizens towards more ecological choices, notably the 2015 state budget measures to reduce the tax advantage of diesel fuel versus gas.

Comments

Why

[Anonymous Coward]

is diesel such a bad fuel? I thought low sulfur diesel in modern vehicles was pretty OK with great gas mileage?

Re: Why

[Anonymous Coward]

Particulates

Re:Why

[0123456]

Have you never driven behind a diesel that's belching out a cloud of black smoke in your face every time it accelerates?

Of course, now they've spent years pushing Europeans to drive diesels with high fuel taxes, good luck convincing them to switch to petrol engines that cost far more to run.

Re:Why

[jellomizer]

My thoughts exactly.
Granted it is not the cleanest fuel.

Re:Why

[Anonymous Coward]

You definitely cannot spot a modern diesel visually. The soot has been under control for at least 10 years now by various technological means:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diesel_exhaust#Remediation

Re:Why

[BradMajors]

Diesel is more fuel efficient than gasoline. Hence, banning diesel will force people to buy more electric and hybrid cars.

Re:Why

[Anonymous Coward]

They certainly are. You cannot see the type of engine from looking at the exhaust for modern cars.

Re: Why

[Anonymous Coward]

Also, every diesel vehicle I've ever had the displeasure of being near stinks terribly, and emits loud, annoying noise from the engine compartment.

Re:Why

[Calydor]

Good luck convincing them to ditch the car they bought in 2013, which is rendered essentially worthless by these changes, and buying a new car with a different kind of engine in it.

Re:Why

[roc97007]

Diesel is more fuel efficient than gasoline. Hence, banning diesel will force people to buy more electric and hybrid cars.

Hm? I would have thought, Hence, banning diesel will force people to buy gasoline cars. Why would banning diesel force people to buy electric (very limited range) and hybrid (additional cost) when gasoline cars are more plentiful, have a significantly greater range, and are cheaper?

Re:Why

[roc97007]

I would be shocked if it weren't the Germans who solved it, actually.

Re:Why

[Anonymous Coward]

Diesel is more fuel efficient than gasoline. Hence, banning diesel will force people to buy more electric and hybrid cars.

Win-win for France if people buy plugins (electric or hybrids). France generates the lions share of electricity from nuclear power.

Re: Why

[smittyoneeach]

We have two TDI diesel manual transmission cars.
The cost per mile is relatively awesome, compared to a gas car.
Because if they don't manipulate the market and tax systems to eliminate diesels, electric cars will remain an expensive curiosity.

Re:Why

[Anonymous Coward]

I was in France twice this year. Driving after a diesel powered car was very unpleasant. Same goes to walking on the sidewalk after a diesel has passed. Maybe its that the maintenance of cars in France is really, really poor, because in other EU countries I haven't notice it so much...

Re: Why

[MShook]

The issue is the particulate filters that are nowadays standards seem to be worse for your health: particles are so thin you can't see them anymore (hence no more belch smoke) but they're also so thin they can now enter your bloodstream more easily.

And modern diesel engines emit more NO2 than they used to.

So the bottom line is: invisible smoke doesn't mean it's better.

Re: Why

[Anonymous Coward]

If you factor in the energy required to make the battery and the typical generation of electricity using coal, a modern Diesel-powered car is on par with an electric car in terms of CO2 exhaust.

And you can get a modern one, used for something like 6000 dollars or euros.

Dont use an American Diesel though, they have a history of making shite Diesel engines. I hear Ford has proper ones recently, though.

Re:Why

[TubeSteak]

Why would banning diesel force people to buy electric (very limited range) and hybrid (additional cost) when gasoline cars are more plentiful, have a significantly greater range, and are cheaper?

Answer:

Energy Minister Segolene Royal announced earlier this year that drivers scrapping diesel-powered cars to buy an electric one would be entitled to a bonus of up to 10,000 euros ($13,500).

The Europeans have never been afraid of using taxes and subsidies to push consumer behavior in the favored direction.
Which is why diesels are so popular over there, since the fuel taxes have favored diesel over gasoline.

IMO, this is a bit nuts, since modern diesels are really clean.
Ultra-low sulfur fuel allows for catalytic converters to limit NOx emissions and particle filters remove most of the carbon soot and fine particles.

I'd be interested in seeing the research the French looked at before making their decision.

Re: Why

[MShook]

http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/wp-co...

TL;DR

For example, Rushton et al. (Rushton et al. 2012) recently estimated that occupational DEE (Diesel engine exhaust) exposure in the United Kingdom was the third most important occupational contributor to the lung cancer burden after asbestos and silica exposure.

They estimate 6% of people dying of lung cancer do die because of diesel particles...

Re: Why

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, recent Ford have decent Diesels, since they collaborated with Peugeot in the design of the direct injection generation. Really in this case the know-how came from Peugeot, who has had good Diesel engines since the early 80s and has a long tradition of building them: in the 60s all Diesels were either Mercedes or Peugeot, at least in Europe.

Re:Why

[MShook]

PSA (Peugeot Citroën) marketed it first: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D...

In 2000, in anticipation of the future Euro 5 regulations PSA Peugeot Citroën became the first company to make filters standard on passenger cars.

Re: Why

[MShook]

And there's this: http://www.cafe-cba.org/assets...

Page 85, line Chronic Mortality * Premature deaths...
40000 yearly deaths based on PM

And this: http://www.researchgate.net/pu...

They estimate that every increase of 10 micrograms of particulate PM2.5 (2.5 as a 2.5 micrometer particulate) per cubic meter (g/m3) would lead to a 6% increase of death due to illness resulting from these particulates.

http://ec.europa.eu/environment/archives/cafe/general/pdf/cba_health_impact.xls

Re: Why

[smittyoneeach]

Whenever I was shopping a couple years ago, you couldn't get a Ford diesel unless you were buying an F-350.
As though an urban weenie like me needs such. Does Ford offer any commuter diesels?

Re: Why

[Anonymous Coward]

That's what I was used to too, until I saw some brand new Ford diesel pickup.

That thing was quieter than a gas vehicle and had no smell to it.

Re:Why

[K. S. Kyosuke]

Why not electric cars with diesel range extenders? I'd think that the constrained operating conditions for the ICE in such vehicle would be as beneficial for a diesel engine as they already are for a gasoline engine, and you won't have to use it in urban areas.

Re:Why

[BLKMGK]

Lol, ummm NO! The Euro market has been waay ahead of the US in this area for awhile. Hell they couldn't bring over their diesels for the longest time because our fuel was too shitty to run them!

Re:Why

[gbjbaanb]

I'm sure they simply looked at the research of how well their car industry was doing and decided to come up with any reason to persuade people to buy new cars.

Diesel is a great fuel to use, very efficient, and the modern engines are not the oil-burners of the past, coupled with the catalytic converters in the exhaust, its often said the emissions are cleaner than the surrounding air in many cities. Certainly, diesel engines are cleaner than petrol ones, and if you consider the biodiesel that many are part running on (I understand the USA runs B20 diesel anyway - that's 20% biodiesel mix in all diesel fuel), even cleaner.

Re:Why

[drinkypoo]

Half the vehicles in my jurisdiction, even brand new, have that bypasses by the owner.

Since you are an anonymous coward, your anecdote is worth even less than the usual nothing. Even if your veracity were assured, we have no idea where you are. We know only that you are cowardly, and make both typos and unsubstantiated statements.

Re:Why

[drinkypoo]

Granted it is not the cleanest fuel.

It is the cleanest fuel. We discussed here on slashdot how (gasoline-driven) cars emit more black carbon than previously thought) and the diesels are more efficient so you actually wind up with diesel as the cleanest fuel once you get the traps and filters and piss injection and whatnot. It's true that gasoline direct injection is close, but it's also true that it takes less energy to make diesel than gasoline, that diesel contains more energy than gasoline per liter, and that diesel is less volatile and thus less hazardous to transport and store than gasoline. All in all, it is the superior fuel. Also, it can be made from biological feedstocks including oils from algae, waste animal fats, and so on, and with proper seals and fuel line linings mixed to any proportion with petrodiesel.

Diesel is a better fuel than gasoline in every single way. If, like Subaru, you build your diesel with opposed cylinders, it doesn't even have to be big and heavy because vibration is inherently cancelled by the design. It's just better. The TGDIs are just as expensive as TDIs. So the only thing wrong with Diesel fuel here in the USA is the taxes, and the only thing wrong with it in France is that they want to get rid of it, probably for a reason mentioned elsewhere in this discussion — it's taxed less there.

Re:Why

[MShook]

Poor decision making from different political camps and good lobbying by PSA and others resulted in "About 80 percent of French motorists drive diesel-powered cars." All because French were ahead of the "smoky" diesel curve back in the 80s.

But it doesn't end here: diesel at the pump should be more expensive than gas. Only a small tax break makes it cheaper.

And because we use so much diesel fuel, French refinary plants don't produce enough of it so we export our gasoline surplus (to say the US) to import diesel fuel. So even on an economical standpoint it doesn't make sense.

Re: Why

[drinkypoo]

The issue is the particulate filters that are nowadays standards seem to be worse for your health: particles are so thin you can't see them anymore (hence no more belch smoke) but they're also so thin they can now enter your bloodstream more easily.

The issue is that there were always fine particulates, and they can't be trivially filtered out. But perhaps you missed it when we discussed here that gasoline engines produce as much soot as diesels, and it is all of the exceptionally-fine kind. Now that the big stuff is being filtered out of the diesel exhaust, all we have left is a relatively small amount of that PM2.5.

Ideally we'd do away with the ICEs entirely and eliminate all that crap, get down to worrying about how to eliminate it from the tires. But what's really pathetic is that we've had the technology at least since the 1800s to solve all of these problems. It's called electrified rail. With modern levels of traffic, it is worthwhile to have people in packets smaller than train cars, however, yet with the distances which must be covered the vehicles must have their own power storage. Current battery and self-driving vehicle technology permits just this particular use case. We have every piece we need to replace cars entirely with PRT save for the will, starting in the densest city centers and moving outwards in stages related primarily to the availabilty of parking.

AHEM. Back on topic. "invisible smoke doesn't mean it's better" is exactly why diesel is better than gasoline. And yet, soot isn't even the worst emission that cars produce! It's unburned hydrocarbons, also known as raw fuel. And by their nature, diesels which are running properly run lean all the time, that's just how they operate. That means they're burning their fuel. It also means they produce more NOx, but that's why diesels now have catalysts.

Re:Why

[drinkypoo]

Lol, ummm NO! The Euro market has been waay ahead of the US in this area for awhile. Hell they couldn't bring over their diesels for the longest time because our fuel was too shitty to run them!

NO! They were way ahead of us for awhile. But now they're way behind, because we've mandated low-sulfur diesel and they haven't, at least not all of them.

Re: Why

[lgw]

Ideally we'd do away with the ICEs entirely and eliminate all that crap

What a hippie! Ideally, come Paving Day, I'll be cruising the Paved Earth in my Atomic Hypercar under the light of the Chromed Moon, and hippies like you will be Pit Slaves, toiling endlessly to clean the restrooms and stock the vending machines for the driving elite.

Re: Why

[Anonymous Coward]

George Burns was a both drinker and smoker into his 90s. Jack LaLanne, who died at 96, always credited his fitness routine and diet with his longevity, but he had an older brother that lived to 97 and never followed the health regimen. There are always people that are exceptions to the rule, with genetics playing are large part.

Re: Why

[TheGavster]

The diesel Fiesta is one of the more fuel-efficient cars of any type that you can buy. Naturally, unavailable in the US, as the only company that seems to bother selling diesels for a purpose other than cargo is Volkswagen.

Re:Why

[Anonymous Coward]

It's bad because of particulates. Diesel engines emit a lot more fine particulates than gasoline engine. This is otherwise known as soot. The size of soot can be measured in millimeters or in size of carbon atoms and everything in between. Soot filters on most diesel vehicles get rid of the large stuff, but the fine particulates, the unseen particles are not.

Sub-micrometer particles are though to increase the incidents of all sort of "general inflammation" diseases. Be that vascular disease (heart attacks, strokes, etc.) or cancer, inflammation caused by these pollutants drives up the incidence.

The bottom line is; if you want a healthy society, you should not run diesel vehicles around. As for electric vehicles, those should be used anyway. There needs to be a place where to dump all that excess solar in Germany :)

Re: Why

[aaarrrgggh]

Cummins at least is dealing with particulate in the cylinder, and using after-treatment to deal with NOx. This eliminates the problem with PM2 generated by PM10 particulate filters. It is a pretty elegant solution and generally makes sense (although the DEF is a pain to need in addition to fuel.

It sounds more like a jobs program to disadvantage German cars though.

Re: Why

[smittyoneeach]

Screw Soviet Russia.

Re: Why

[smittyoneeach]

"unavailable in the US"
Which was my point.

Re: Why

[Dare nMc]

>modern diesel engines emit more NO2 than they used to.
While it is true that Modern Diesiel engines produce more NOx than they used to, it doesn't matter, because now they are using DEF to remove N02 converting it to water and pure nitrogen.
> standards seem to be worse for your health
that is completly wrong especially in the US, the exhaust standards significantly restrict (like 50x reduction in the last 10 years) emissions of carbon monoxide (CO), oxides of nitrogen (NOx), particulate matter (PM), formaldehyde (HCHO), and non-methane organic gases (NMOG) or non-methane hydrocarbons (NMHC) emissions.

Re: Why

[cheesybagel]

Guess what. If the filters weren't there you would be breathing the thin particles and the large ones too.

So it ain't worse. Plus most of the particles come from sulphur, which is being eliminated from diesel.

Re: Why

[mlts]

Isn't this what DPF and DEF systems are for? DPF systems mean that there is a filter which gets clogged every so often so the diesel vehicle is in the shop for a â3000 replacement, especially if the vehicle idles often. The DEF system provides for the vehicle being in the shop for a new engine (or at least a new set of injectors and high pressure fuel pump) when a novice vehicle owner gets confused and pours the AdBlue into the fuel tank and not the piss tank. Since the diesel-engined vehicle is kept off the road by both of these things, particulate issues are well addressed.

(/sarcasm.)

Re:Why

[mlts]

The days of the smoke-belching, dog-slow Mercedes turbo diesels which forced people to pass on the breakdown lane in order not to get asphyxiated are long gone, even though those were a scourge of the roads. One can walk behind a Sprinter, Ford F-350, or other diesel vehicle made within the past decade, and there won't be a smell, and there is likely to be no smoke, other than when the engine is started.

Of course, there are coal rollers who deliberately de-tune their engines to run rich and reprogram the ECMs for the black smoke... but in my neck of the woods, the local police will actually scrape off the inspection and registration stickers, or even tow a vehicle on the spot (since it is not considered road-legal) to the nearest diesel shop if the DPF/DEF/EGR stuff is deliberately destroyed.

I personally detest wasting fuel. Diesel isn't cheap.

Re:Why

[mlts]

Diesel engines also could use gasoline as fuel. It requires some engineering due to the differences in compression, but it could be done.

I agree... diesel is a better all around fuel. Modern ethanol-based gasoline has a lifetime of weeks, while diesel with bug killer can be stores in a tank for much longer and still be usable.

There is also the biodiesel aspect. Biodiesel can be made from almost anything oily/greasy, be it cooking oil, fat from a meat packing plant, waste motor oil that is filtered, or anything along those lines. Of course, it has different lubricant properties than normal diesel... but if a gasser engine can run on booze, it isn't that hard to adjust programming on a diesel to run on B20-B100.

Re: Why

[Stargoat]

Nonsense. Why are you lying?

Modern diesels cannot be told apart from gasoline. They do not stink and belch smoke. I should know, I have two.

Re: Why

[fustakrakich]

cui bono, monsieur..

Re: Why

[fustakrakich]

Probably, with the will, we would have had today's technology 10,000 years ago. But our saving grace is that we are still moving forward and we are moving faster..

On the subject at hand, as long there are internal combustion engines, I personally prefer compression ignition with no throttling over the spark ignition, which and does frequently misfire, sending all sorts of yucky chemicals out the pipe. Really the best thing would be an external combustion engine that continuously burns the fuel. That is the cleanest way. I sure wish more effort was put into developing Stirling engines now that we have better materials. They could turn an generator like on a diesel-electric locomotive and the batteries would be used for rapid response so the engine doesn't have to, and you don't have all that silly 'hybrid' stuff with transmissions by Rube Goldberg..

Re: Why

[Firethorn]

but that's why diesels now have catalysts.

This reminds me of what I think is the most important bit - identifying the most polluting cars and getting them off the road(or at least out of the cities).

We're to the point that a California emissions car in the USA on average actually CLEANS the air. It's exhaust has fewer pollutants than what's going in. The problem is now things like older cars, lawn mowers, weed eaters and other small engines. A lawnmower running for an hour can emit more pollution in an hour than a modern car will all month.

Get rid of various exceptions if you have to, but go after the actual sources of pollution. If that's older diesels, so be it.

Re:Why

[Anonymous Coward]

"Diesel is more fuel efficient than gasoline."

The Diesel cycle is more efficient than the Otto cycle. However the main reason diesel engines are more efficient in practice is:
1. Diesel starts off with ~30% more energy (BTUs) per volume
2. Higher compression ratio.

The later is rapidly shrinking, newer technologies (eg: direct injection) mean modern petrol engines have higher compression ratios than they used to. (9:1 -> 12:1, better than older diesel engines)

Once laser ignition (allows better combustion chamber geometry and strength) and lean burn technologies (mixed spark and compression ignition) make it to production. Petrol engines will swing back to being the cleaner engines, mainly because the fuel starts off cleaner (more refined).

There's also been little investigation into the long term problems caused by adblue and other urea additives used in Euro 6 diesel engines with a selective cat. I imagine this will be causing higher uric acid production, and may be subject to further environmental concerns as the number of such systems increase.

Re: Why

[haruchai]

Agreed - if we're serious about cleaning up our act, no crappy engines should be grandfathered.

Re: Why

[MShook]

It sounds more like a jobs program to disadvantage German cars though.

Meh, many small (under 2l) German diesel engines are French made (Mercedes, A and C Class -> Renault, BMW, Mini Cooper -> PSA at least until 2015 where it'll be over I think), only VW stands on its own. So it's really going to piss the French car manufacturers as well.

Re: Why

[Alioth]

I don't think so. The French make awesome small diesel engines, if this disadvantages anyone it will be the French.

Re:Why

[Alioth]

The car industry conspiracy doesn't hold any water - French carmakers are famous for making really good small diesel engines.

Re: Why

[ColaMan]

I bought a 2007 Peugeot with a 2 litre turbo diesel when they first came out. For the first month I often stalled it when pulling away from a standstill because I couldn't hear the engine inside the car.

It got 4.4L / 100km on the highway and I could drive 1100 km on a tank of fuel.

Three months and about 8000km after I bought it I stuck my finger in the exhaust pipe and wiped the inside. It was clean. You could still see the streaks from the forming process inside the pipe.

Modern diesels are NOTHING like the old mechanically injected rattlers.

Re: Why

[Anne Thwacks]

In Europe, for about 10 years we have had a series of legal restrictions on what diesle engined can emit, called Euro 1, Euro 2, etc.

From Euro 4, these have been met by running the engine very hot, which creates masses of oxides of Nitrogen, and then neutralising the NOx by squirting ammonia into the exhaust pipe. his works fine in a laboratory environment. Unfortunately, a truck can go from buring 20 ccs of fuel per hour to burning 2 litres a second* in two turns of the crank shaft, and there's not a bat's chance in hell of getting the ammonia to match the NOx during the transition. These engines produce very fine particulates that can go strait through the skin - and enter the blood through the lungs very easily. Real life pollution is very bad. Unfortunately, the option of running the engines cooler and filtering out the lumps of carbon mechanically, was ruled out, because the people selling the Ammonia (pig's piss, sold as "Ad-Blue") paid vast bribes to the European comissioners. MAN Diesel demonstrated an engine that could do this but did not put it into production "for commercial reasons".

Manging the supply of, and carrying expensive 5% Ammonia solution around with them is something truck owners and drivers would go a long way to avoid - though whether that goes as far as buying auto-transmission trucks (which is MAN's product) is another question. They are really difficult to reverse into a loading bay with potholes near where the rear axles come to rest (ie most loading bays). We are talking up to FIVE rear axles here.

* Think: reaches bottom of hill in fully loaded 44 ton truck at just over 56MPH (truck speed limit for Europe) and stamps on the throttle pedal of a 16 litre turbo-charged engine as he hits the incline of the upward hill.

Re: Why

[Eunuchswear]

If you factor in the energy required to make the battery and the typical generation of electricity using coal, a modern Diesel-powered car is on par with an electric car in terms of CO2 exhaust.

Ok, I know its traditional the not read the article, or even the summary, but could you try reading the headline?

"France Wants to get rid of diesel fuel".

We don't make electricity from coal here, we make it from nice clean uranium.

Re: Why

[Firethorn]

no crappy engines should be grandfathered.

You'll always need a certain amount of grandfathering, but something along the lines of requiring upgrades to commercial vehicles every 5 years, and maybe upgrades to personal ones after 5-10 years might help.

But yeah, if it's ill maintained and therefore polluting more or came from a crappy line that barely passed when new, encourage it's replacement.

Re: Why

[smittyoneeach]

Always with the U2 references. . .

Re: Why

[amorsen]

Modern vehicle do NOT need to belch smoke. Only museum vehicles and egotist owners do that.

I do not believe that Denmark or the UK (the only countries I have extensive experience in) have a single modern diesel vehicle which does not belch smoke.

Almost all of them burn nice and clean when they are on the motorway, with warm engines and exhaust, but once they get into the cities the smoke starts again. Unfortunately people tend to live in the city, not on the motorway.

Re:Why

[amorsen]

Gasoline engines have lousy part-load efficiency. Hence it is great to pair them them with an electric motor so they can run full-load whenever they are running.

Diesel engines do not really have that problem. Hybrid diesels only have the benefit of regenerative braking, and that is not enough for a reasonable payback on investment.

Re: Why

[LiMikeTnux]

I drive a 2013 Freightliner with a DD15 15 liter diesel fitted with DPF and DEF. 300,000 miles on it. Its fairly quiet and doesnt stink a bit.

Re: Why

[LiMikeTnux]

DEF isnt a terrible pain, to be honest. Its just another expense. I dont have to fill the DEF tank every time, and about the 3rd fillup of my twin 150 gallon tanks is when I need to. Most fuel stops have bulk DEF at the fuel islands, I just pull out a different nozzle when I'm done fueling and press another button.

Re: Why

[Anonymous Coward]

same here, Jetta TDi 2012, low noise, amazing mileage, no smell, great torque.

Re:Why

[gbjbaanb]

It makes no difference how god they might be, but the excuse needed to make people buy more of them.

The government until recently said that diesels were the preferred choice and were more fuel efficient, so people sold their old petrol cars and bought diesels.... now they say the opposite and guess what you think they want to happen.

Re: Why

[flyneye]

Yeah, big deal, there's oil in the fuel. That's Diesel.
When they've rid the fuel of oil and it's straight gasoline, the oil is separated and used elsewhere, putting it in the environment, just the same.
The only difference is; it may not be in the air at first, it may go directly to ground or water.
The silly French are trading good mileage to appear environmentally conscious to retards who can't process steps in thinking past 3 moves.
Silly French, silly enviroMENTALists and silly anybody who didn't think of it before reading this post.
Keep your diesel, you may as well, you only lose money and help no-one by removing it. I'll bet a politician or two is in this besides enviro-wack-jobs. How else could it be so fucking patently stupid on the face of it?

Helpful tip; if you possibly ever can; get hold of a Mercedes Diesel, you can put more miles on them, than any other car on the face of the planet! I know of several with over 1000000 mi. and one with over 2000000 and only 2 rebuilds.

Re:Why

[AmiMoJo]

From your own link:

"However, when compared to petrol cars with a catalyst, diesels have higher emissions of NOx and much higher emissions of particulate matter."

Diesels are bad for human health and keeping cities clean. Even the newer ones are worse than petrol engines for PM2.5.

Re:Why

[AmiMoJo]

Sometimes it's really worth reading TFA before you make a fool of yourself. They are not banning cars bought in 2013 at all. They are going to promote a move away from diesel over a number if years, and offer incentives to change. If you want to keep your old, dirty car you can.

Re:Why

[danbert8]

Diesel is also a much safer fuel as it's not as highly flammable and explosive as gasoline.

Re:Why

[Calydor]

Sometimes it's really worth reading the comment another comment replies to before replying to that other comment yourself.

That post talked about getting people to switch to a different engine, and while I admit I'm not a mechanic, I don't think you can just pull out the diesel engine in a car and install a petrol engine instead for anything resembling a reasonable price.

Re: Why

[mspohr]

... Except for all that CO2

Re:Why

[donstenk]

A 2013 car would in all likelihood pass the EURO 5 or 4 emission standars and have a particle filter so it should be fine for many years to come.

Re: Why

[fustakrakich]

Wouldn't know. Not a fan....

Re:Why

[donstenk]

This is how it works in the Netherlands. Taxing and tax breaks make many people choose environmentally friendly cars like hybrids and electric. In this country is Tesla costs about 18.000 euro's if you factor in the tax breaks over a period of 3 years. This is also the reason the Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV is the most sold SUV.

Re:Why

[donstenk]

Forgot to add I am grateful everytime a hybrid or electric car drives through our street without polluting the air locally.

Re: Why

[fustakrakich]

Oh....hahahaha.... cute...

Re: Why

[drinkypoo]

Get rid of various exceptions if you have to, but go after the actual sources of pollution. If that's older diesels, so be it.

If they're not blowing unburned fuel, which only happens if they have something really wrong with them, they are no longer realistically a problem because there are so few of them. California just went after the last commercial diesels without smog equipment, they had to retrofit or sell to another state. Now it's just a handful of private vehicles. By all means, though, go after the dickheads who modify their vehicles specifically to make more smoke. They are blowing unburned fuel, and they are assholes.

Re: Why

[FlyHelicopters]

Ideally we'd do away with the ICEs entirely and eliminate all that crap, get down to worrying about how to eliminate it from the tires. But what's really pathetic is that we've had the technology at least since the 1800s to solve all of these problems. It's called electrified rail. With modern levels of traffic, it is worthwhile to have people in packets smaller than train cars, however, yet with the distances which must be covered the vehicles must have their own power storage.

Yea, get stuffed... I have no interest in riding public transport, bleah...

I'm quite happy with my personal vehicle, thank you very much...

Re: Why

[vandamme]

Except for the ones that you don't realize they are diesels.

Re: Why

[drinkypoo]

Yea, get stuffed... I have no interest in riding public transport, bleah...

I'm quite happy with my personal vehicle, thank you very much...

Rail-based PRT does not rule out personal vehicles. It would cost you more to have one, because you'd have to pay for a siding with switches and not just a driveway, but you could still have one. Or you'd store it at a facility, and it would pull up out front of your house on a schedule, or after a short delay.

In the current system, your neighbor has to pay for you to be able to drive your car up to your front door, by helping you maintain the road system. Under PRT, you would have to pay the cost to park in front of your house yourself. But you would still be able to have a private vehicle. Vehicles could be made which would drive both on PRT and on carriageways, but it would be inefficient.

Finally, you might be happy with your personal vehicle, but automobiles are unsustainable on our current energy infrastructure before we even talk about the tires. I brought them up initially because they are a source of fine particulates even when used as they are meant to be used. But PRT on a rail doesn't have tires, so we both eliminate a lot of rolling friction and a lot of dust and waste. I don't want to breathe your tires. I don't want to breathe my tires. We can and should do better.

Re:Why

[BLKMGK]

So which Domestic manufacturer is making cutting edge consumer diesel in the US exactly? If I want to buy a diesel these days it sure as hell won't be from GM, Ford has them in trucks, Mercedes and VW aren't Domestic. Who exactly is ahead?

OP stated we solved this "long ago" and I'd still say that NO the Euro folks beat us to those solutions. We may or may not have surpassed them but if so our domestic market sure doesn't show any sign of it...

Re:Why

[drinkypoo]

So which Domestic manufacturer is making cutting edge consumer diesel in the US exactly? If I want to buy a diesel these days it sure as hell won't be from GM, Ford has them in trucks, Mercedes and VW aren't Domestic. Who exactly is ahead?

The problem is that the statement was "is diesel such a bad fuel? I thought low sulfur diesel in modern vehicles was pretty OK with great gas mileage?" and your reply was "Lol, ummm NO! The Euro market has been waay ahead of the US in this area for awhile. Hell they couldn't bring over their diesels for the longest time because our fuel was too shitty to run them!" We are specifically talking about the area of diesel fuel quality, in which the USA is in fact superior to most of the rest of the world, as I said.

If you cannot manage to stay on topic, you're gonna have a bad time.

Re: Why

[AvitarX]

Really? Reports about le mans when audi won with a diesel engine a few years back said that the winning car was quite enough that if it was driving through a neighborhood nobody would call the police.

Re:Why

[BLKMGK]

You might want to note which post I was responding to. I was responding to the statement that "The US solved that problem long ago...." regarding the creation of emissions technologies.

My statement is accurate - the best diesels were unable to be imported here for a number of years because the Euro cars with better emissions equipment required low sulfur fuel which we did not offer. The US didn't solve the emissions issues the Europeans did, they were ahead of us. Our domestic manufacturers still seem unwilling to produce a decent diesel if it's not for a truck.

If you cannot manage to understand the posting order and responses, you're gonna have a bad time.

My question still stands - which Domestic US manufacturer has this cutting edge diesel tech that's ahead of the Europeans in production?

Re:Why

[udippel]

Why don't I have any mod points? I'd throw all at you.
probably my only chance is to put in another redundant post further down just to stress that you are spot on!

I used to be a francophile person throughout. But in the last ten, twenty years they have disappointed me left and right. So sad.

Re: Why

[davydagger]

it was like someone puked out a whole bunch of words and cobbled them together. congradulations, your fucking dumb.

Re: Why

[EvilAlphonso]

In the real world, I have never been able to get even close to the announced mpg-rating of the 2011 econetic fiesta. I had one for 3 months as a replacement vehicle and I enjoyed it except for the mileage. My 2011 A3 2.0TDI has consistently given me a better mileage, even with the DSG gearbox... I do get around 54 MPG with the Audi.

Re: Why

[Kvasio]

you could always import; just as some people from Europe do with american cars.
Or with european cars when there is right EURUSD rate (like in 2007)

Re: Why

[smittyoneeach]

Getting it by you was funnier than the joke proper. :-)

Re: Why

[smittyoneeach]

We're going to import, all right--an Audi Q7 with a TDI and a stick, the way you can't even get it configured in CONUS.
Right after a string of bank robberies* to fund said chariot, that is.

--
*Not a serious statement of intent to commit crime.

Re: Why

[Firethorn]

By all means, though, go after the dickheads who modify their vehicles specifically to make more smoke. They are blowing unburned fuel, and they are assholes.

I agree; I would not be surprised if the average such asshole pollutes as much as 10k correctly operating diesel engines every time they 'roll coal'.

Proper response to such dickhead: Confiscate their truck. That will stop it really quickly.

Re: Why

[Firethorn]

... Except for all that CO2

CO2 isn't a pollutant though there are concerns with releasing too much of it. I'm actually getting irked with the EPA because getting that last 1-2% of pollution is costing serious gas mileage, which translates to more fuel burned which means more CO2 per mile.

Of course, if you look at my posting history you'll see that I'm a major proponent of electric cars and nuclear power plants.

Re: Why

[toddestan]

It's practically impossible to import anything newer than 25 years into the US unless it's an exotic or a not street-legal race car. On the other hand, if you just want a commuter car I suppose you could pick out a nice late 80's Renault/VW/Peugeot/Mercedes/Ford/whatever and import that.

Re:Why

[toddestan]

The military has such beasts, such as the M35 2 1/2 cargo truck, which are designed so that in a pinch you can use just about anything that'll burn (kerosene, gasoline, jet fuel, av gas, gasoline, ethanol, whatever) as fuel. Of course, they really prefer running diesel, and standard practice is if you're going to burn something like gasoline to throw a quart or two of oil into the tank to keep things lubricated.

Re: Why

[FlyHelicopters]

All I can say is that you're living in a dream world if you think cars and trucks are going away.

Even suggesting it isn't worth discussing, it simply isn't going to happen. Not in our life time anyway.

Re:Why

[Firethorn]

Diesel already costs more in capital costs than gasoline systems. It's also more durable and such, so it does tend to even out. Still the idea with a range extender is that you don't use it much. Which would actually favor diesel technically because it doesn't 'go bad' like gasoline left to sit can, but you still have that capital cost increase. Electric cars are dropping in price very quickly, to the point that buying a more capable EV is competitive with what a diesel range extender would cost.

Re: Why

[fustakrakich]

With me, you will always win the internet..

Re: Why

[flyneye]

I point out YOUR folly and I'm dumb. Yeah, I can see that's how these kind of messes get started. I live on the fucking planet of the dumb apes who can't tell the difference between polluting in a profitable way or polluting in an expensive way. Either way you're going to pollute, but, are you going to make the most of it or are you going to throw EXTRA money needlessly at it?

Back off the medication, if plain English gets to be too much for you.
Perhaps you strayed from the "Better Homes and Gardens" forum and can't tell the difference.
On second thought, maybe you better double up on the Zoloft.

Re: Why

[eionmac]

If this lung cancer percentage is important, then why is France, where diesel cars are in majority not carrying out major studies on DEE lung cancer?

Re: Why

[mspohr]

CO2 is a pollutant and is the primary driver of climate change.
The EPA would like to reduce CO2 emissions. Burning more fuel would increase CO2 emissions which is not the goal of the EPA. Not sure where you got the idea that reducing pollution from cars increases CO2.

Re:Why

[roc97007]

> But it doesn't end here: diesel at the pump should be more expensive than gas. Only a small tax break makes it cheaper.

I'm not trying to be argumentative, I'm genuinely curious -- why should diesel be more expensive? It's my understanding that diesel is a less refined form of petroleum -- that it takes less work to turn oil into diesel than it does to turn oil into gas. So assuming that the government hasn't "picked the winner" through taxation, diesel should be cheaper. Could it be that the government is taxing diesel further upstream, and then rebating part of that tax at the pump? (They do that sort of thing all the time in the US.)

Re:Why

[roc97007]

LAIR!!!

  We dont make cars in america no more! haha

Ok, minus the hyperbole, you may have a point in there somewhere, but I'm pretty sure that Teslas, at least, are made in Fremont, California.

Re: Why

[mjwx]

We have two TDI diesel manual transmission cars.
The cost per mile is relatively awesome, compared to a gas car.
Because if they don't manipulate the market and tax systems to eliminate diesels, electric cars will remain an expensive curiosity.

You mean to say "If they stop manipulating the market". For the most part diesel fuels are subsided or at least have tax concessions, especially in Europe.

Also, diesel cars aren't really that more efficient. Take these two Golfs.
1. VW Golf 110 TDI Highline with a 2L turbo diesel engine producing 110 KW uses 4.9L / 100 KM.
2. VW Golf 103 TSI Highline with a 1.4L twincharged petrol engine producing 103 KW uses 5.2L / 100 KM.
What's important to note is the petrol car is both cheaper to buy and faster than the diesel. Also VW's have a DPF (Diesel Particulate Filter) that need to be replaced every so often and isn't cheap.

Also diesel is more expensive to buy, the difference between unleaded petrol (RON 91) and diesel is $0.17 per litre in Australia and here diesel is subject to the same tax rules as petrol (so no subsidies or concessions). Not to mention that servicing is more expensive on a diesel.

Diesel cars are a huge false economy. It takes about 10 years for any savings to make back the difference in the purchase price let alone the extra costs of upkeep.

Re: Why

[Firethorn]

CO2 is a pollutant and is the primary driver of climate change.

It is NOT a pollutant, much like how water isn't - normally. It's only a concern when levels get too high, much like with water- too much in one spot is bad. As they say, the poison is in the dose. Pollutants are those things that you ideally want to reduce to zero.

Not sure where you got the idea that reducing pollution from cars increases CO2.

Not sure why you think it doesn't. Still, quick rundown: The CO2 emissions from a vehicle are pretty much entirely from the fuel it burns. 1 gallon of gasoline = 19.64 pounds of CO2. 22.38 if it's diesel. Assuming a well running car, all of the fuel will be burned. Pollution from the exhaust of an automobile consists of items like SO2, CO, NOx, and particulates. You get rid of the first by having low sulfur fuel. The second by running a lean mixture - plenty of oxygen to burn all the carbon. NOx compounds are tricky in that you get MORE of them by running a lean hot mixture. But that's where the catalytic converter comes in - it uses catalysts to re-react NOx back to O2 and N2, as well as finish burning any remaining CO. Particulates depends on complete burning of the fuel.

All this means that car manufactures aren't just trying to maximize fuel economy - they're tuning the engine to pass emissions, which isn't the most fuel economic.

The situation is most apparent with diesel - the regeneration of the soot trap 'require the engine to consume several gallons' and 'This has been shown to adversely affect the overall fuel economy of vehicles equipped with DPF systems'.

Re: Why

[smittyoneeach]

My US cost per mile is cheaper than for a gas car. You get half again the distance per cubic unit of fuel, for a 25%? premium on fuel cost?
With the thickness of the taxation involved, it's not exactly easy to make a fair comparison.
Almost as bad as going to a hospital and asking for the cost of a lone aspirin tablet.

Re: Why

[Thelasko]

And modern diesel engines emit more NO2 than they used to.

I believe you mean N2O. NO2 is broken down by SCR. Unfortunately, N2O can be formed as a side effect of the SCR reactions. However, N2O is regulated as a greenhouse gas.

Re: Why

[dl_sledding]

I disagree... The only really "shite" modern American Diesel engine (by popular opinion, anyway) was the Ford 6.0 Powerstroke engine. That engine was plagued with design issues because of misunderstandings between Ford and International (who made the engine for Ford). By and large, the American diesel engines are actually very good. Cummins makes all the diesels for Dodge, which is arguably one of the finest diesel engine companies in the world. Chevrolet has made their own for many years, and was at one time (still may be?) partnered with Detroit Diesel. Ford is now making it's own and from what I have heard they have a winner in the 6.7. I see many, many used Diesel trucks for sale with close to or more than 300,000 miles on them. That's unheard of with gasoline powered vehicles. The problem with American diesels is that they are only available in heavier duty trucks. "Normal" half-ton and smaller pickups and other trucks have not had a diesel option until very, very recently, and those options are very few and far between. No American made car has a diesel option, due to the poor experience people had in the '80s with the horrible deployment of sub-par diesel engines in the Chevys. I have owned a diesel for many years, and it far outperforms a gasoline engine in just about every way, except for the fact that I need to drive a larger sized truck to have this option. I get much better mileage (under a load, better than twice what a gasoline powered truck can get), more power, and fewer problems. If the automakers would make a smaller version of their diesel engines and put them in their half-ton and quarter-ton trucks (like VW with their Amarok), they'd have a big, big win on their hands in the American market. As I said, that is starting to come about, but it is taking a long time as the automakers are skittish, and the importers are not pushing their diesel offerings to their customers. Also, the cost of diesel (in the US) is 20-30% more than gasoline at the pump, which also scares away consumers... even though that cost is easily compensated for by the MPG increase of the diesel over the gas versions. People don't really understand that. It's really a consumer education problem.

Re: Why

[dl_sledding]

AHEM. Back on topic. "invisible smoke doesn't mean it's better" is exactly why diesel is better than gasoline. And yet, soot isn't even the worst emission that cars produce! It's unburned hydrocarbons, also known as raw fuel. And by their nature, diesels which are running properly run lean all the time, that's just how they operate

I'd like to add to this, to emphasize exactly how important this point is. Because I think this is glossed over and ignored way to often, and it's a very important distinction.

Anyone who has ever performance tuned gasoline and diesel engines knows this point to a fault. To get the best performance out of a gasoline engine, the tuner gets the fuel to air ratio as lean as possible. However, on a gasoline engine, if the tuner goes too lean, it will damage the engine to the point that internal components will be damaged and require replacement!

However, you can lean a diesel out to the point where it just will no longer run, and NO DAMAGE WILL OCCUR. You can err on the side of "lean", and if you make a mistake, there is no consequence, other than the need to richen the mixture. Nothing will break. Diesel engines make more power by increasing the mixture, running the fuel to air mixture richer. They will break if the tuner gets too rich, as the exhaust gas temperature rises to the point of melting something or even to the point of a hydrolock, where the piston cannot physically compress the mixture due to an excess of fuel.

Why does this matter? Because, the leaner you can run an engine, the more efficient you can get. With a diesel, there is no drawback to running lean, so you have a much safer environment to make efficient power. With gasoline, there is always the specter of lean-burn damage waiting there in the efficient zone.

Re: Why

[cthulhu11]

Agreed. Diesels can get somewhat better mileage, at a higher cost per gallon.

Re: Why

[cthulhu11]

Now that the big stuff is being filtered out of the diesel exhaust

... if only that were true.

Yeah, 80%

[Anonymous Coward]

From what I know with my north-american perspective, the reason diesel is so popular in Europe (excluding some countries) is that it's not as heavily taxed as gasoline, as a concession to the commercial transport industry. Combined with greater per-liter fuel economy, it becomes advantageous to use it instead of gasoline, ignoring pollution downsides. The 80% figure is surprising, I thought it hovered around 40-50%.

How does France imagine to accomplish this phaseout? To transform 80% of its automobile fleet would present huge costs both to government and to the individual drivers. Will there be subsidies for electrics? Lower taxation of gasoline fuel and gasoline-powered cars?

Re:Yeah, 80%

[TWX]

Heh. As an automotive enthusiast in the United States, I'm glad that our laws have generally applied such that a vehicle, once it has been certified by the relevant governing body, does not later generally need to meet more stringent emissions standards. As far as I'm aware, a vehicle's emissions certifications only get less-strict with time if they change at all, not more strict, and to do otherwise would put undue financial burden on a lot of people that cannot afford to retrofit or replace vehicles, which is why they're driving old cars in the first place.

I do live somewhere where vehicles are generally immune from the effects of the environment- people have literally pulled old heaps out of the desert, cleaned off the years of caliche built up on top of the floor pan, dropped a modern engine in, and turned them into hotrods. As a consequence we still have emissions testing on everything back to 1967 when federal emissions first came into effect, but even still it's not hard to meet the rules for a given year.

Changing that would cause riots.

Re:Yeah, 80%

[stephanruby]

Heh. As an automotive enthusiast in the United States, I'm glad that our laws have generally applied such that a vehicle, once it has been certified by the relevant governing body, does not later generally need to meet more stringent emissions standards.

May be for the average Joe, but not for commercial truck drivers in California.

My neighbor for instance, had to trade-in his newer 18 wheeler truck for a refurbished older model in order to save on the huge upgrade cost of complying with the new Californian emissions standard. That combined with the higher fuel costs (at the time) did not make him a happy camper.

Re:Yeah, 80%

[beltsbear]

As tough as a pill as that is to swallow, it will save him money as the new truck will be more efficient.

Re:Yeah, 80%

[CrimsonAvenger]

Umm, looks like the guy you're responding to wasn't switching from old truck to new, but from new to old....

Re:Yeah, 80%

[whoever57]

As a consequence we still have emissions testing on everything back to 1967 when federal emissions first came into effect, but even still it's not hard to meet the rules for a given year.

Different states have different regulations. California, which has a climate that is very conducive to long-lasting cars (even in the Sierras, they don't use salt on the roads) only tests cars those built in 1975 or later. And there are 6 counties where vehicles registered in only certain zip codes are required to be tested. The rest are exempt.

It's a trap!

[Etherwalk]

Maybe it's a very roundabout plot to tax heating. Diesel works in place of heating oil, right?

Re:It's a trap!

[ShieldW0lf]

Yes, in the same way that antique furniture works in place of firewood. If you're not freezing to death waiting for your tank to be refilled, it's a pretty stupid choice.

Re:It's a trap!

[Mashiki]

The difference between the two is the colour used to mark if it's for "fuel use" or "home heating use" it's all about the amount of tax paid. Home heating oil is about 20c/L cheaper than what you can get at the pump.

Re:It's a trap!

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

Valls said taxation would have to orient citizens towards more ecological choices, notably the 2015 state budget measures to reduce the tax advantage of diesel fuel versus gas.

I'm gonna go out on a limb and guess they will be raising diesel tax slowly and not lowering gas tax at all.

Re:It's a trap!

[Mashiki]

I'm gonna go out on a limb and guess they will be raising diesel tax slowly and not lowering gas tax at all.

Mine as well, since Canada ships a lot of diesel fuel to Europe it really doesn't make any difference to us. It just means a larger stockpile here, I heat with diesel(aka furnace oil), and ever since we increased exports there the cost of oil has gone up every year. So I'm perfectly fine with this.

Re:It's a trap!

[Nonesuch]

Are there more impurities in home heating oil?

I'm in New England, and like many US states, we have a 25c/gallon tax on '#2 Road Diesel' (tax paid, no dye added), this is always Ultra-Low Sulfur Diesel (ULSD). Generally fuel sold for use in cars is only about 10-15% more expensive than fuel sold for use in a furnace, and most of that is highway tax, not extra distillation at the source.

For Delivery, you can can specify either 'Home Heating Oil" or "Off-Road Diesel". Both are #2 Diesel and contain dye (indicating no road tax was paid), and in most US states, both are at least Low Sulfur, but several states now mandate ULSD for heating oil. There is more margin for variation in the grade of oil sold as heating oil than for off-road diesel, but usually they come out of the same tank & truck. Off-Road Diesel is used for construction equipment, generators, etc. In the winter, when delivering off-road diesel, they might add kerosene and/or additional anti-gel treatment, only because home heating oil is usually stored underground or in a basement while construction equipment and storage tanks are more exposed to the elements.

Re:It's a trap!

[ShieldW0lf]

That is an overly simplified statement. Some grades of fuel oil are almost identical to some types of diesel fuel, but there are many grades, and they're not all the same. You do have to be careful what you put in your engine.

This page is informative:

http://www.enviroharvest.ca/di...

Re:It's a trap!

[Mashiki]

You're going to be hard pressed to find anyone who sells anything but grade #2 in Canada these days, you know why? Because of So2 regulations.

bio-diesel?

[roc97007]

Ignoring for the moment that there is probably not enough bio-diesel by several magnitudes to meet the need, I wonder if bio-diesel would also be phased out.

Re:bio-diesel?

[Motherfucking Shit]

It's France, of course they have plenty of French fry grease for biodiesel!

Re:bio-diesel?

[Anonymous Coward]

That would be Freedom Diesel in the U.S. ?

Re:bio-diesel?

[roc97007]

Well, french fries aren't... ok never mind. (This could turn into a Hercule Poirot routine.)

I mean, isn't this the same France that decided that since the eye is most sensitive to the middle part of the visible spectrum, that all cars should have lenses over them only allowing that part of the spectrum, requiring French drivers to make their way by dim, mucus-colored light? [1] Point being, they already have a history of making sweeping, ill-advised decisions involving automobiles. I wonder if this one will be rescinded when all the ramifications come to light.

[1] I just looked it up, and it's called "Selective yellow" and was mandatory for all illumination in French vehicles until the 1990's.

Re:bio-diesel?

[Chris Mattern]

Well, french fries aren't... ok never mind.

And turkeys aren't from Turkey. (They can't fly but they can dance)

Re:bio-diesel?

[roc97007]

Well, french fries aren't... ok never mind.

And turkeys aren't from Turkey. (They can't fly but they can dance)

Not what I meant. "French fries" originated in Belgium, not France.

Re:bio-diesel?

[roc97007]

That was Arthur Carlson, the station manager, who had the idea of throwing Thanksgiving turkeys out of a helicopter on unsuspecting shoppers, giving us the famous line: "As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly". Les was covering it live. "Oh my God they're dropping like bombs! One just went through a windshield! Oh the humanity!"

One of my favorite shows, along with Night Court.

Re:Make Worlk Program ?

[LiMikeTnux]

All new trucks in the US have DEF (urea) systems and DPFs now, my 2013 Freightliner doesnt belch a bit of black smoke, either.

Pushing the problem onto someone else

[Kris_J]

So Diesel cars in France are basically unsellable and anyone who has one can look forward to fuel costs rising ahead of petrol for the rest of the time they have it. All that's going to happen is that Diesel cars that would have gone to or stayed in France will flood the rest of the EU.

Re:Pushing the problem onto someone else

[mrspoonsi]

Cars have a lifetime (10 to 15 years), it is not a huge time to wait to replace them.

Re:Pushing the problem onto someone else

[angel'o'sphere]

The rest of EU already has strict laws agat pollution. E.g. that Diesel engines need a filter against particles. Or have laws that only cars allow into the cities that meet certain cleanness requirements.
Paris even had to shut down car trafic last year because of smog. That is very unheared of since decades in europe.
You see very dirty cars in Paris every day, because no one really cared so far.
So, no: the old french cars are not sold into the EU ... it is the opposite around. Like myself: I export my car to france as I can mot use it in my town anymore because it is one glimpse of a fraction above the alowed emissions.

Re:Pushing the problem onto someone else

[sribe]

Cars have a lifetime (10 to 15 years), it is not a huge time to wait to replace them.

I don't know about Europe, but in the US cars typically have a lifetime of 20 or more years. In fact, the average age of cars on the road is a bit over 11 years. Remember, cars do not typically go from 1st owner to scrap yard, but rather to a second owner, and not uncommonly a 3rd.

Re:Pushing the problem onto someone else

[r1348]

About the shutting down traffic being rare in Europe, I beg to differ: it happens quite regularly here in Milan (basically we live in a natural cul-de-sac that accumulater pollutants.

Re:Why Not phase out gasoline?

[Anonymous Coward]

Diesel is simply the better engine technology. Look up Carnot Cycle and it will tell you.

The only drawback is the particulates, which are said to cause cancer as they are very, very small. Those have been brought under control with massive technological effort.

Re:We never said that....

[angel'o'sphere]

Like the rest of Europe, France is phasing out nuclear for wind and solar.
It is just not big news yet.

Political nonsense

[seoras]

The reason 80% of percent of French motorists drive diesel-powered cars is because they are the most economical option.
Not just French but in most of Europe you'll find the diesel car is the popular option as it's the most economical choice.

The introduction of the "AdBlue" legislation on goods vehicles, and now private vehicles, has reduced the pollution deficit in comparison to petrol to a point which is even better. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diesel_exhaust_fluid

Take a typical French family car and compare same sized engines of petrol and diesel (this car has AdBlue).
http://www.nextgreencar.com/view-car/49548/citroen-c4-grand-picasso-1.6i-vti-vtr+-120hp-petrol-manual-5-speed
http://www.nextgreencar.com/view-car/49561/citroen-c4-grand-picasso-1.6-e-hdi-vtr+-115hp-diesel-manual-6-speed

Which one pollutes the most? Why the hell would you want to start "phasing out" the cleaner car?
Why not just offer everyone driving a fossil fuel car the same incentive to move to electric?
Why pick on diesel when it's now cleaner?

I'm all for electric and the end of burning fuel to drive around but you have to ask the question of WHERE that electricity is coming from to charge up your car?
Is the problem just being shifted?

At least when you burn the fuel yourself you have the choice of which fuel you burn and how well you burn it.
When you are consuming electrons off a grid you've given up a lot of your freedom of choice.

Re:Political nonsense

[queazocotal]

'reducing the tax incentives'
You can bet they're not lowering the tax on petrol.

Re:Political nonsense

[MShook]

The reason 80% of percent of French motorists drive diesel-powered cars is because they are the most economical option.

It's not the most economical option because as people mentioned, the higher purchasing price means one needs to drive around 10000 or 12000km (that's around 6200/7500 miles) a year to get a financial benefit.

The issue here is more of the chicken and egg kind: because of the lower prices at the pump and the incentive governments have been giving away, people nowadays buy diesel because it's what everyone has or wants. When you want to use your used car, if it's not a diesel, you can forget about findind a buyer.

Re:Political nonsense

[MtHuurne]

I'm all for electric and the end of burning fuel to drive around but you have to ask the question of WHERE that electricity is coming from to charge up your car?
Is the problem just being shifted?

In France, a lot of electricity comes from nuclear power plants, so in terms of CO2 reduction switching to electric driving would help. But that transition is going to take a while; it's unrealistic to expect everyone who now drives a diesel to buy an electric as their next car.

As far as I know, and this seems to be supported by your links, modern diesels don't pollute more than modern petrol cars. So if this would be about reducing pollution, they should crack down on old and poorly maintained diesels.

I don't know about France, but in the Netherlands students get free (but limited) public transport use, so very few students drive a car. That keeps a lot of old and poorly maintained cars off the road.

Re:Political nonsense

[MShook]

When you want to SELL.

Re:Political nonsense

[Blaskowicz]

As was said in one comment before the real issue has got to do with crude refinement. Not only we use too much diesel and not enough gasoline.. These days, we can generate more gasoline in proportion from the crude. And the demand for diesel fuel from hauling trucks and the like will not go away. So the French have gone too far in favoring diesel cars (from a high amount of diesel cars, the trend has only increased for the past decade or two).
I would favor reducing car use and number of cars but policy will be to incentivize people to burn more gasoline and less diesel.

Re:Political nonsense

[ihtoit]

no, plenty of people will buy CFL lamps because candles are too dangerous in the environment where light is needed and incandescents are banned in the jurisdiction. Given free choice, I would go for incandescants every single time. I fucking hate CFLs, they give me serious headaches.

Re:Political nonsense

[ultranova]

I fucking hate CFLs, they give me serious headaches.

I wonder if there would be a market for no-flicker CFLs - it's not that hard to turn AC into steady-voltage DC - or if it's spectrum-based? How do LEDs work for you?

Re:Political nonsense

[ihtoit]

LEDs I'm OK with as long as they're HF pulse-driven arrays (such as the Cree) or regulated DC and 5800K-6000K. What I'm usually faced with in terms of CFL is the cheap bulbs that use magnetic ballasts, they flicker like buggery and set me right off almost immediately if I don't vacate the room - that's made job interviews problematic on occasion. The newer better quality ones still cause me problems (I still see the flicker) but it takes longer for headaches to trigger off those.

problem is NOx not CO2

[Anonymous Coward]

Every talks of CO2, the problem with diesels is the NOx. No amount of trying to fudge the exhaust system will help with that, having worked in a workshop for a few years I've seen the first hand effects of the emission control systems and they are unreliable. In the UK you need to drive > 12,000 miles a year for a diesel to even start to make economic sense but people get so hung up on fuel costs they don't look at the TCO of a vehicle and go for the one with the lowest fuel costs.

Re:problem is NOx not CO2

[cheesybagel]

Gasoline engines also emit NOx. The solution for both is to use a catalytic converter. In the past you could not use platinum catalysts with diesels because the sulfur content poisoned the catalyst but that is no longer true with ultra-low sulfur diesel available.

Pretty stupid idea - diesels burn less per 100km

[Anonymous Coward]

Pretty stupid idea.

My Ford Focus with diesel uses 4,5l per 100km. My wife's Opel Astra uses 8l of gasoline per 10km

Is burning almost twice more of gasoline is better for the environment? I doubt it.

Re:We never said that....

[Chris Mattern]

Because it's not happening yet. Actually, they're phasing out nuclear for coal, oil and gas because that's what can take over the load.

USA pushing it's interests

[Anonymous Coward]

Plain and simple France is a bankrupt county. Someone is bribing it's gov't to let USA take foothold in decision making, while aggressively pushing USA way of doing things benefiting USA companies exports. Recently, remember?, they convinced Baltic countries to "be free of soviet aggression" by buying more expensive gas from USA.

Re:Why Not phase out gasoline?

[MightyYar]

They are also heavier and more expensive. Nothing comes for free.

Tax advantage?

[gadget junkie]

actually, there's no tax advantage at all, if you count by type of fuel: the days of low price for diesel/high price for petrol have left Europe long ago. aaaannd, good luck with the truck industry: Diesel has a kind of economy of scale whereby you can easily build large diesel engines, but it's actually quite difficult to build economical, big petrol engines.
Luckily, the central case is much more benign: since such a measure cannot be adopted by a single EU state, this slimy politician will gain brownie points by looking enviromental [ akin to a wookie "fly casual"], all the while knowing that it cannot and will never be adopted, with all the practical hassle involved. move along, nothing to see here.

Re:I call BS, source: compare jetta

[MightyYar]

2.0 TDI is 9.2s 0-100kph. 2.0 TSI is 6.5s 0-100. Why would you compare these two engines? Even the 1.4TSI is more powerful than the diesel at 8.5s, and then your comparison is much less favorable:
148 g/km for the gasoline vs. 143 g/km for the diesel. I leave it as an exercise in judgement as to whether the 3% improvement is worth the cost.

I've long said this.

[sunking2]

Circa 2006 I used to travel to Roune. Lovely city, amazing architecture, almost all of it completely black. I mean black hole black. So bad that they were power washing them with bleach other something else to try to restore them. Did a great job, for about a year. I soon came to the conclusion that the US actually did make the right choice. Now I understand the low sulfur should be a game changer. Either Valls isn't convinved, or he's targeting other things that may not be using the low sulfur. But I think it's a move that is 50 years too late.

Re:I've long said this.

[Blaskowicz]

i assumed you meant "Rouen", for readers. (Normandy, place where Jeanne d'Arc's trial happened)

Re:I've long said this.

[Anonymous Coward]

There has been a LOT of cleaning going on recently. You probably wouldn't recognise the place! As I understood it, the industrial revolution and wood/coal burning was the culprit.

(I Iive in Rouen)

Re:I've long said this.

[AmiMoJo]

Even low sulphur diesel is pretty bad. It's like "clean" coal - better, but still awful.

Re:BINGO

[MShook]

First roadworthiness check happens after 4 years for a brand new car then it's every 2 years.

The reasons...

[guruevi]

1) Diesel enjoys great tax breaks all over Europe. If you gas up with diesel, the government receives a smaller share than with Gasoline. Diesel cars are a LOT cheaper to own and operate in Europe. From my experience with the EU, this may be mandated and thus may not be able to be fixed by individual states.
2) Gasoline cars are harder to repair at home and break down more often and sooner. Fixing a diesel, especially the older ones, is easier but that is a lot less profitable to either business or government.
3) Many people in Europe skip the Diesel taxes all together by (illegally) driving on "red" home fuel diesel or avoid the markup by having their own tanks of 'white' diesel at home. Truckers sometimes have a switch installed that allows them to temporarily switch from 'red' to a reserve of 'white' for check points.
4) You can make a diesel car (especially the old 70/80's VW, Mercedes, Jeep and other 'tanks') run on several kinds of oil including old filtered frying oil, skipping taxes and duties all together.

Re:The reasons...

[CBravo]

In the NL diesel cars are aboute 2 to 3 times more expensive to own. I pay 115 euro per month in road taxes (instead of 43 for the gas version).

Re:The reasons...

[CBravo]

In the NL there no longer exists red diesel, except for boats (iirc).

Re:The reasons...

[PPH]

5) If you can wean people off diesel for use in private vehicles (or keep it from being adopted widely like in the USA), then you can manipulate the gasoline supply during oil shortages or war time without interfering with commercial trucking and other operations. All the government needs to do is to call refineries and change the fraction of diesel vs gasoline and no rationing system will need to be put into place.

Re:The reasons...

[mjwx]

2) Gasoline cars are harder to repair at home and break down more often and sooner. Fixing a diesel, especially the older ones, is easier but that is a lot less profitable to either business or government.

You've got that one backwards.

Diesel engines are more complex and require more regular maintenance. Most diesel engines are turbocharged to produce the same power as a naturally aspirated petrol engine of the same displacement. Also with DPF diesels, replacing the DPF can get quite costly.

Re:BINGO

[Teun]

The problem in France is not necessarily with manufacturing standards, after all they export to other countries and can be competitive.

The French problem is typically a lack of maintenance, where the northern countries have fairly strict annual safety and emission tests the French are more laissez faire and now it bites them back.

Re:BINGO

[MShook]

No idea, I was talking about the French laws.

Re:What Maker ???

[Anonymous Coward]

So you have ever pumped Diesel ? Did your hands smell a bit after that or not ?

Plus it is a health&safety thing. Diesel fuel does not evaporate as easily and will do more damage to your skin than petrol because it stays longer on YOU. Instead of simply evaporating.

So yes, these plastic gloves are a Good Thing(TM). The hydrocarbon required for them is made up with much less fuel consumption.

Re:Why Not phase out gasoline?

[drinkypoo]

They are also heavier and more expensive. Nothing comes for free.

It does if you're subaru and you've got opposed cylinders and thus it doesn't have to be heavier, and the whole world is moving towards turbocharged gasoline direct injection anyway which means the engines cost just as much as diesels. and guess what? they foul their intake valves more than diesels do! hilarity ensues.

Ram 1500 Ecodiesel

[sjbe]

Check out the Ram 1500 Ecodiesel. 400ft/lbs of torque and gets almost 30mpg highway. Interior and suspension are nicer than the Ford too. Also GM is introducing a Colorado diesel in 2015 that might be worth a look.

Re:I call BS, source: compare jetta

[BLKMGK]

He's talking about emissions and you're talking about 0-100KM?

BTW, my TDI VW has yet to get an MPG as *low* as the sticker claimed and it's over 6years old. Fast it's not but it gets moving okay.

Guarantee you've passed by a VW TDI

[jpellino]

and never knew it by sound or odor.

Re:Guarantee you've passed by a VW TDI

[Anonymous Coward]

Definitely, The only time I realize mine is a diesel (other than filling up, of course) is a faint 'diesel rattle' when it's really hot.

Seen the e-Golf?

[jpellino]

Most impressive electric I've seen. 90 mile range. A stock 2015 Golf in every other respect. $700 four-hour Bosch home charger.

Re: Seen the e-Golf?

[gweilo8888]

90 miles is frankly pathetic. That's a best case scenario 45 miles there and back; less with frequent starting and stopping. And 45 miles by road is probably not like 35 miles as the crow flies. Imagine a 35 mile radius around your home. You cannot get any further than that without recharging. And that's supposed to be good mileage?

These work for a regular daily commute of relatively short distance, nothing more. In the real world you need to own a second car to do anything useful after work, on weekends and holidays, or when taking a vacation. And if you need a second car for that, you bought the wrong first car.

Re: Seen the e-Golf?

[gweilo8888]

That should have said "And 45 miles by road is probably more like 35 miles as the crow flies."

Re:Seen the e-Golf?

[smittyoneeach]

I'm a manual transmission freak.

Re: Seen the e-Golf?

[haruchai]

" less with frequent starting and stopping" - probably not much less, if it has good regen braking, and they don't idle.
In 4 decades of working, I've never lived more than 20 miles from work and while I work with lots of people who live much further away, almost all of them drive but only to the train station.

Most couples and families I know have 2 or more cars anyway so if one's an EV, the long weekend drive is no problem.

Re: Seen the e-Golf?

[drsmithy]

90 miles is frankly pathetic. That's a best case scenario 45 miles there and back; less with frequent starting and stopping. And 45 miles by road is probably not like 35 miles as the crow flies. Imagine a 35 mile radius around your home. You cannot get any further than that without recharging. And that's supposed to be good mileage? I wouldn't hesitate for a second betting a comfortable majority of drivers rarely, if ever, drive more than 90 miles in a day. Heck, I'd be pretty confident that a fairly large proportion (say, between 25% and 50%) rarely exceed 50 miles in a day.

Re: Seen the e-Golf?

[Alioth]

In 2014, I have driven more than 45 miles from my origin on exactly two occasions, and one of those was in a rented long wheelbase van.

Re: Seen the e-Golf?

[tandavanadesan]

I would be worried on whether it could manage my 10 mile each way commute in winter. Being up a mountain I usually do half the mpg on my commute that I do on a long journey and in winter when the idiots with Sumner tyres tesicr the climb yo a series of walking-pace drives between stuck cars that mean waiting for a gapbin the oncoming traffic to pass its much worse

Re: Seen the e-Golf?

[Zorpheus]

I think electric cars need at least the range extender of the Chevrolet Volt for such cases. In other words a fuel powered generator to supply electricity for longer trips.

Re: Seen the e-Golf?

[deal99]

Recharge at work and its 180 miles round trip :)

Re: Seen the e-Golf?

[Isaac-1]

It is not about what percentage of the population exceed 50 miles in a day, it is what percentage of the population exceeds 50 miles in a single day once or more per week/month. This is the thing that demands the ownership of the second car. Personally I commute about 17 miles each way to work, plus another 3-5 miles round trip on days when I have time for a lunch break (sometimes in my car, sometimes carpooling with others for lunch), so sure it would work on the average work day, but take yesterday as an example when we went to my wife's sisters house for a late holiday gathering 50 miles away, plus a 5 mile out of our way side trip to drop off a key for someone, then a run to the grocery store once we were home.... It all adds up, and for me that means a driving of over 100 miles in a single day on average a bit more than once per week, and a trip of over 300 miles in a day about once per month, or maybe a bit less, more often this will be 300-500 miles over the course of 2 or 3 days every few months.

Re: Seen the e-Golf?

[unimacs]

I have no idea how many models of cars of trucks are available in my area but I imagine it's quite a few.

Just a wild guess, but I'd say anywhere from 40 to 80% of them would be unsuitable for our family due to cost and features, yet they still exist and many are very popular. What I'm saying is that the fact that an e-Golf wouldn't work well for everyone doesn't mean it couldn't work very well for a large number of people.

My family might be a good example. We live in a city and are are fairly close to everything that we need to get to on a regular basis. In fact, I ride my bike to work most days (about 6 miles each way). We have one small fuel efficient car that's getting up there in age and one mid-sized SUV we use when hauling more stuff, more people, or when the roads are bad.

We don't put a lot of miles on either vehicle but the small car is driven less than 8,000 miles a year, - under 22 miles per day on average. We very rarely drive it over 90 miles a day and could easily avoid it.

Re: Seen the e-Golf?

[davydagger]

in the united states, the average commute can be long and tedious. 90 mile range is somewhat bullshit and limiting Teslas have 300 mile ranges, and lets see what they can do with the model 3(300 mile range commuter car). The other impressive thing they have is the super charger, of which they've opened all the patents up, so charging one of those cars takes 1/2 hour. Not great, but it does make charging stations that operate like gas stations feasible.

Re: Seen the e-Golf?

[davydagger]

I think we need more remote charging stations. Tesla has a 120kW "super"-charger. For long trips we simply need supercharger stations like we have gas stations.

Re: Seen the e-Golf?

[haruchai]

So? The country is a lot less rural than it used to be and I've already pointed out that most families have more than one vehicle.
Also, maybe farm country can use all those wind turbines to power their "little e-cars".

Re: Seen the e-Golf?

[toddestan]

For many people, a 90 mile range is just fine. For a family with more than one vehicle, having one car with a 90 mile range because they'll just use the other car for long trips. I do agree that we need more serial hybrids, but pure electrics also have their place.

Re:Seen the e-Golf?

[toddestan]

Doing a trip like that in an e-Golf would be crazy. But that doesn't mean you couldn't own one, and rent a car for a trip like that. Heck, I know people with a perfectly functional gasoline powered car that still like to rent for trips like that.

Re: Seen the e-Golf?

[rjr3]

One of the clever things about electric cars - and some new gas cars - is they shut down their engines when you are just sitting. With an electric car if you are not moving forward you are not using battery - with some small ( radio, lights, heater ) drain.

With an electric car ... if your range is 90 Km ... it pretty much means you will drive 90 Km not like a car that can just sit and idle and use up fuel.

Re: Seen the e-Golf?

[rjr3]

Where do you live ?
For those monthly 300 to 500 mile trips I can rent a car from Enterprise for $14/day. Even if I pick it late the worst is $25/day.

I would sure rather pay $25/day 12 times a year and only spend $800 a year on the electrical costs of a Leaf ( EPA estimate ) the rest of the year.

Find an online interest calculator and pretend to invest the savings from an electric car compared to an average gas car for 20 years; it can be the cost of a college tuition or 1/2 the price of my house when it was new. Don't forget that money spent is after tax - you really had to earn more then what you spent.

Now don't electric car(s) deserve a second look ?

Re: Seen the e-Golf?

[dl_sledding]

I live in an extremely rural, farming state. Better than 90% of my co-workers would easily be able to manage with a 90 mile range, and unless they are actually FARMING, that percentage would hold up in a more widespread fashion in the retail and service businesses here. People are very needlessly range-conscious, in my opinion, and if they would actually look at their odometers each day (as they cross their garage thresholds), most would realize that even 40 range miles would be plenty for day-to-day use.

push consumer behavior in the favored direction

[NotQuiteReal]

" push consumer behavior in the favored direction"

Ignoring the irony that diesel was once such a favored direction...

Re:Yeah, 80%--I call BS

[TWX]

I have lived in communities that required vehicles to be inspected for their emissions. If you car failed, the car had to be "repaired" before the owner could get a current car tag. The car repair hit "a lot of people that cannot afford to retrofit or replace vehicles" hard. Car inspection is on the decline because it creates an intense dislike among those voters whose cars are inspected on a yearly basis.

But the standard is only to the level it was when the car was manufactured. The standard is not raised beyond that.

Owning a car costs money even when it's paid-off. I know, I used to drive nothing but beaters as I was poor, and I did have to contend with cars that failed emissions. Thing of it is, fixing the car once a year cost about the same as a single car payment would have, so it was not too much of a burden to handle.

Re:Compared To Cigarettes

[Anonymous Coward]

cigarette filters are good countermeasure against diesel soot.

Re:Fast, but not Quick

[speedlaw]

mk 6 TDI manual here. 37 mpg combined no matter how hard spanked, 40 if driven nice. The car is fast...it will roll along at any speed up to about 105 that you choose, all day, no matter the hills, but it isn't fast getting there. Kind of like getting a train up to speed. The true test is that at 90 mph, it is as quiet as my e46.

Re: Why -- Can't smell a diesel

[Anonymous Coward]

I own a 2014 USA Jeep Diesel with an Italian sourced diesel. It uses the standard Diesel exhaust fluid (Urea) system and it it very clean.
I can get my face one foot away from the exhaust with it running and there is no odor. I see no black exhaust either.
The pollution control systems work.

Re:What Maker ???

[I'm New Around Here]

He doesn't spill it on his hands. The pump handle gets diesel on it, that then transfers to the users' hands. If using disposable gloves helps eliminate a problem, why the grief that someone figured this out?

Title is bogus

[geantvert]

There is nothing in the article about France trying to kill diesel. The purpose of those measures are to get rid of OLD DIESEL CARS that are well known source of pollution (for the particules).

Re:Title is bogus

[Uzull]

correct! title should say old car...

especially when the french car industry is most advanced in the area of diesel engines - renault nissan decided several years ago concentrate the design of diesel engines within renault and gasoline engines with nissan.... peugeot is even selling complete engines to bmw. some minis and bmw series 1 use peugeot engines.

i doubt very much that the french goverment would give such important area of the french industry

Re:Title is bogus

[Liquid Len]

There is nothing in the article about France trying to kill diesel. The purpose of those measures are to get rid of OLD DIESEL CARS that are well known source of pollution (for the particules).

No. The plan is to get rid of old diesel cars indeed, but also to incentivize people to acquire gasoline rather than diesel cars. This will be done by applying some kind of malus on new diesel cars, and also by progressively aligning the price of diesel fuel with the price of gasoline (diesel fuel has been significantly cheaper than gasoline in France).

Meanwhile, the US quietly criminalizes veg oil

[Anonymous Coward]

Meanwhile, in the US, the government quietly criminalized the conversion of fryer oil into fuel for diesel cars unless the 24.4c gallon federal diesel tax is paid by the person who uses it. There will be a line and worksheet in the 2014 1040 packet for reporting this tax.

Re:We never said that....

[cheesybagel]

They are phasing out nuclear for wind and natural gas from Algeria. Thing is the extraction is to the south of the country close to where most of the Al-Qaeda thugs who invaded Libya came from. Good luck!

Re:The reason

[cheesybagel]

Not with the latest technology it isn't. About as dirty as gasoline or arguably less.

This is probably the French state trying to get Nissan-Renault to sell more Nissan Leafs.

FTFY

[Chas]

Valls said taxation would have to orient citizens towards more expensive choices

There! I've thoroughly grammar-corrected the line from the original Surrender Monkey.

Re:I call BS, source: compare jetta

[MightyYar]

He's talking about emissions and you're talking about 0-100KM?

Of course I am. You have to look at similar engines. The 1.4L gasoline engine is the one to compare to the 2.0L diesel.

Re:Well

[MightyYar]

Show me a diesel car with similar performance that doesn't weigh more than it's gasoline counterpart and add a significant cost.

Re:Why Not phase out gasoline?

[MightyYar]

It has to be heavier to handle the increased stroke and pressures. The Subaru diesel comes at a premium of several thousand dollars, yet it only manages 148 HP from 2.0 L. The gasoline 2.0L can almost do that in it's normally aspirated version, mid-to-upper-200s for the turbo. Yeah, there is torque, but that only gets you so much. If you were towing it would be different. You can buy a whole lot of gas for $5000, or consider that you might do better with a hybrid.

Re:Why Not phase out gasoline?

[drinkypoo]

It has to be heavier to handle the increased stroke and pressures.

It barely has to be heavier to handle increased stroke, and it doesn't have to be at all heavier to handle the increased pressures because of the inherent design of the engine.

Yeah, there is torque, but that only gets you so much. If you were towing it would be different.

We have these things called gears, perhaps you have heard of them.

Re:I call BS, source: compare jetta

[Blaskowicz]

Try something like 60-100kph or 40-100. Diesel often wins for these real-world accelerations because of torque at low rpms, while the acceleration figures for gasoline is some dragster type of driving revving up to the red zone which no one does unless they're psychopaths.

Re:What Maker ???

[fustakrakich]

So yes, these plastic gloves are a Good Thing

Wait a minute, you actually spend money on that? Why not just grab one of the paper towels they use for your windshield? Actually I think diesel and Chanel go good together...

Re:The reason

[Blaskowicz]

Not that smoggy though Paris is and maybe a few more places. Most places are smog free, though highest traffic streets and urban highways are not very nice of course. General lack of fossil fuel burning power plants and widespread electric heating do wonders.

Re:The reason

[ihtoit]

you forgot what powers those electric heaters.

Power plants.

(OK a lot of France's power comes from nuclear now (39%?), notwithstanding that twat Hollande's stated intention in January of this year to cut nuclear output by a third by 2035 with zero regard for what's going to replace it).

Re:I call BS, source: compare jetta

[ihtoit]

you haven't seen British drivers.

(they're psychopaths).

Re:Fast, but not Quick

[ihtoit]

my old Ford got that, and that was a 75 P plate station wagon, 1298cc Kent Crossflow block (same engine used in the Pinto for the US market). Only topped at 86mph, but it got me where I needed to go.

Re:The reason

[Blaskowicz]

I suppose there will be wind and solar backed by natural gas generators, leading to a small CO2 emissions increase. Nat gas at least burns really clean, we tolerate burning it indoors.

What have they found that's better?

[Mirar]

So, what have they found that emits less than diesel?

Modern diesels (= last 20 years) with particle filters doesn't emit much.
HIgh compression gasoline motors is starting to generate the same particles. It seems like you will get those particles if you have an efficient motor.

Any pure fuel will emit less, since it's easier to optimize the engine for it.

But can France produce enough ethanol (and the needed E100 cars) for that?

Or are they hoping for electrical cars?

Re:I call BS, source: compare jetta

[Alioth]

I guess these psycopathic British drivers is why Britain has some of the safest roads in Europe and the world (with around only half the fatalities per million kilometers compared to the US or Canada)

Re:The reason

[Alioth]

France right now, at this very second, is fuelling 98% of their demand with nuclear.

http://www.gridwatch.templar.c...

Re:The reason

[Eunuchswear]

(OK a lot of France's power comes from nuclear now (39%?),

Well, if by 39% you mean 80% and by "now" you mean since the 1980's.

Re:Pretty stupid idea - diesels burn less per 100k

[Malc]

4mpg?

Did you mean 8 litres / 100 km?

Re:So an EDF Buttfuck

[Eunuchswear]

Well, personally I'd like to breath rather less pm2.5's

A fall in CO2 emissions would be nice, but whatever France manages to do will be offset by your transition from nuclear to brown coal.

Re:The reason

[Blaskowicz]

Right now France uses 96.76% of nuclear and 15.73% of hydro, which adds up to 112.49%, plus 3.90% of gas giving 116.39%, plus the other shit.

hey, this site is nice at least. bookmarks. The six neighbors (ignoring Luxembourg) use 1.77% to 5.59% of our demand each. Pumped hydro uses only 0.11% (there's a grand total of only one dam doing it).

About 122% of demand is produced, so nuclear is only doing a bit under 80% of the production.

The French

[JimSadler]

Frankly France exhibits far more intelligence than the people in the US give them credit for. Our system in the US acts like cancer and tries to perpetuate all of our current qualities and wrongs. It sort of self heals regardless of what changes are needed. Here we see all kinds of organized and quite likely criminal opposition to Tesla cars being introduced despite the fact that they are the most superior vehicle one can buy. I wonder to what degree French companies and politicians will resist phasing out diesel engines. This type of resistance to change is exactly why the US has not been on solar, wind and water power for decades. It is not that it is not good or too expensive. It is all about propaganda and lies and big business wanting to keep a tight grip on energy supplies. Really folks, just dwell upon this stuff for a bit. If the US has an energy supply issue why do we allow any exports of coal, oil or natural gas at all? If you are short of groceries in your home do you rush to sell what little food you have?

Re:The French

[MtViewGuy]

The problem with diesel engines is simple: it's ungodly expensive to make a diesel engine just as clean as a gasoline engine. For example, the Daimler-Benz "BlueTec" system that uses common-rail direct fuel injection, a sophisticated particulate filter, and urea gas injection into the exhaust stream to break down the NOx gases for easier catalytic converter removal costs a lot of money per car, to say the least.

Besides, with battery technology rapidly improving, we may soon have 400 to 500 km per charge range electric cars without the need for a big an heavy battery pack, which means electric vehicles are now very viable for commuter cars.

Re:Why Not phase out gasoline?

[MightyYar]

The proof is in the pudding. Show me a diesel car that is competitive performance-wise with a gasoline car and I'll show you a price premium of $5000-7000 and a heavier vehicle.

Re:I call BS, source: compare jetta

[MightyYar]

I can't find the passing times for the 1.4tsi or 2.0tdi Jetta, so I can't comment on those. Perhaps your Google-foo is better than mine.

A diesel is certainly going to require less downshifting and by definition they cannot rev as high so they are less buzzy. A lot of people love them, and that alone might be a very good reason to pay the premium. But they aren't the magic technology that a lot of enthusiasts make them out to be - the slight increase in efficiency comes with some penalties, and they probably don't beat gasoline hybrids which have a similar cost penalty.

Re:I call BS, source: compare jetta

[Blaskowicz]

Anyway I'm sure your "2.0 TDI" and "2.0 TSI" both have high performance, when both options are powerful I don't believe the difference matters that much.

France is very slanted towards diesel for biggers cars (and you have e.g. BMW catering to the diesel market a lot, in addition to French makes) while a small car maybe ought to be gas powered but perhaps uniquely the French buy a ton of small diesel cars (e.g. Peugeot 205, 206, 207 over the years). It's most dumb for short commute and groceries kind of use, as it hardly has time to warm up.
If I really had a need or want for a car I'd choose a cheap high-mileage gas one (but sucks to pay for insurance and inspections if I want to use it as little as possible)

Diesel sucks in cold climates, I mean T-34...

[Anonymous Coward]

> They *still* don't behave worth a damn in cold climates or even northern continental winters

Reality chimes in: ALL soviet russian tanks have been diesel-powered since circa 1939, starting with the infamous T-34. Have you heard of the famous russian General Winter, who wins all wars? And diesel worked for him, there. Starting is possible three ways: a pack of beefy batteries, compresssed air bottles and a geared flywheel with handcrank for utmost emergencies.

BTW, the engine is a V-12 cyl. diesel, originally designed by BMW for zeppelins, hence the alu block casting. As airships went out of fashion, the design was sold to Hispano-Suiza (a french car, engine and firearms company, despite the misleading name). There, the design was sold on to the soviets for pennies by the crypto-communist french "left popular front" government on the verge of WW2. The russkies promptly put it in tanks, to increase the range and torque and reduce the fire hazard versus Otto-cycle engines, which the Reich and anglo-american tanks used.

Re:I call BS, source: compare jetta

[MightyYar]

Well, obviously if you are in a country where diesel is cheaper, that's the way to go! I'm in the US, so the diesels make no economic sense unless you are going to be putting a ton of miles on the car, or for situations where you need the huge amount of torque (like towing). Our gas in pretty cheap here, currently around $3/gallon (0.64 Euro/Liter)... honestly I don't even pay too much attention to efficiency. People get impressed by the MPG figures, forgetting or not knowing that diesel is more energy-dense and takes more crude to make. The diesel cycle is definitely more efficient, but only marginally, and not without other tradeoffs - especially cost and weight. My dad has a diesel truck to tow his camper, and it is a huge improvement over his old gasoline truck.

The Brutal Diesel Tax...

[HockeyPuck]

I'm in California where gas is finally getting down to the $3.06/gal range for regular unleaded. Diesel though is still hovering around almost $.60 more per gal.

What burns me is that it isn't just the $.24/gal tax that's the difference but that you can find two Diesel providing stations that have wildly different prices, they could be different by $.20-.30...

Re:I call BS, source: compare jetta

[ihtoit]

the national speed limit here is 70mph. You only really get that on an outbound clearway where there is no stationary traffic. Our busiest motorways average 30-50mph in real usage, if you're doing 70 there's likely nothing in front of you for at least a mile. The busiest road into London (the M4 through Brentford) has a permanent speed limit of 40 between the M25 Junction 4b (Heathrow Airport) and the Chiswick Flyover. There is no logical reason for that limit to be in place.

What does cause congestion though isn't speed limits so much as ANPR cameras. Drivers slow down when they spot these so's not to get booked, this causes tailbacks and incidents.

Re:I call BS, source: compare jetta

[Blaskowicz]

I believe mathematical work has shown that with congestion, a general slow down improves traffic.
The human factor is of course, er, what it is. It should be slowish all the way, sensible speed depending on conditions, and well just keeping the distances should do it.

Even telling that I know I might drive like a prick if I were in a hurry (such as being late on morning). Does your big road has decreasing speed signs, aerial text displays and the like? (before 40 mph choke point and especially before your crazy OCR camera). What about campaigns asking drivers to keep calm, let the steam blow off and just drive gently (like teaching the benefits of not tailgating). I am naïve but fuck, can't these people forget about the race and angst. Driving a car to/from work puts them in the world's 10% most well off already and they can't fucking manage to be happy.

Re:Fast, but not Quick

[BLKMGK]

Sure, I had a Chevy Sprint that got as good a mileage as my Jetta. It also was built like a beer can, had no airbags, the AC slowed it on the highways, and it wouldn't come near to passing today's emissions. Apples to Oranges - today's cars weigh tons more than previous generations, have real safety features, and if the same drivetrains were dropped into cars of yesteryear would get mileage ratings that would drop jaws.

Re:Fast, but not Quick

[BLKMGK]

I just got my worst fill up ever - 31MPG. Traffic here is awful with a 12mile commute often taking near an hour. I think they've switched us to winter fuel too. Generally I'm 38 with bumper to bumper traffic and have never been on a highway trip long enough to drain the tank. I regularly get over 50miles on a fill! I'm driving it less with the delta between gas and diesel being as high as it is but I have little doubt that will be changing.

Re:I call BS, source: compare jetta

[BLKMGK]

Uhh okay - so 3% difference in emissions, this seems to make arguments about awful diesels a bit moot. Now go look at the MPG. While looking at the MPG realize that the diesel ratings are usually inaccurate. Go check out Fuelly for real-world results.

What would be nice is a way to keep diesels in tune more easily. As they age they tend to smoke more and for those that are electronically controlled this should be solvable.

Re:Why Not phase out gasoline?

[drinkypoo]

The proof is in the pudding. Show me a diesel car that is competitive performance-wise with a gasoline car and I'll show you a price premium of $5000-7000 and a heavier vehicle.

All I have to do is wait and examples will be everywhere, because gas cars are moving to turbocharged direct injection right now, and that's eliminating the cost advantage. They're just as expensive as diesels because they have basically all the same parts, even though they tend to use less metal because most engines don't have opposed cylinders. Right now though, there's few like models to compare, although I did find one high-end counterexample: The BMW/Alpina B4/D4. The M4 costs £59,145, the B4 £58,950, the D4 £58,600. They all have extremely similar performance, they all have 3 liter engines, they all have twin turbochargers, they all have direct injection. The diesel has a little less horsepower and a little more torque, and by all accounts is slightly less exciting if what excites you is the car feeling like it's fast when you diddle the throttle, but it feels just as good to drive and it's right around the same numbers.

TL;DR: New emissions restrictions are pushing gasoline to be just as expensive as diesel, but it's still an inferior fuel. And in fact, the new gasoline engines foul their intake valves in a way that the diesels don't.

Subaru isn't aiming for maximum performance out of their diesel. But they will, since the diesel performance segment is heating up. It's not just in europe, but also in the US. Cummins is starting to crank out some exciting engines again, light-duty sized engines with heavy-duty levels of output. They have the potential to reduce fuel consumption in OTR trucking substantially.

Re:We never said that....

[angel'o'sphere]

Actually it is happening yet, just look out of a window ... rofl. Or google if you never saw a french wind or solar plant.

Redundant!

[udippel]

But I can't help it.

Diesel is the better fuel, it results in a lower consumption, less dangerous. Buy a barrel and try to set fire to it, you'd be surprised! Try the same with petrol (oh, please don't!).
Consumption is lower, I mentioned it. In the refining process, it comes out as the 'lower quality', though.
Buy a modern diesel engine, and it neither stinks nor does it make more noise.

The whole thing is a sick publicity stunt by the former girl-friend of the French president.

I could agree on one single item where diesel is worse than petrol: that's the particles in the exhaust fumes. However, these are not dangerous at all to nature. It only so happens that they are seen at the origin of one or another cancer. But that's a problem mostly to us, the oxygen-breathing species. How can we dare to use significantly more oil, and waste mother nature's resources; produce more CO2; generate more heat, etc. for just one egotistic reason: prevent a number of lung cancers. A number that fades into oblivion compared to the numbers produced by the Marlboro Man and his followers, the pollution produced by capitalist enterprises around the world, including the 'communist' PRC.

The real problem with French diesel...

[zou258]

...is that it is used by a lot of very old cars and trucks. Unlike modern vehicles, they stink and smoke a lot. Even those with (now mandatory) particle filters end up polluting because the owners will not bother maintaining their filters. The police never stop vehicles on the road to check that they conform to emission standards.
Because we French love to enact laws that are never applied. So don't hold your breath on this one...

Ocean going ships...

[BlindBear]

I live in Brisbane Australia and I bought a new Golf diesel 2011 model, goes like hell, great economy and lower pollution rating etc than any of the petrol locals could produce at the time. Better value for money, better car, easier on the environment... everyone a winner. Given a choice I will never buy a petrol engine again, the diesels are just that much better. At the time I took a bit of interest in the pollution and efficiency side of things and read around and stumbled upon a couple of links about the big polluters..... http://earthjustice.org/featur... http://www.theguardian.com/env... There is plenty more info out there, you just have to want to be informed. Happy reading guys and gals, I hope Santa is good to you all this year.

Re:The reason

[ihtoit]

my figure comes from 2012 (EDF leaflet when they started touting for business inthe UK, didn't interest me since I was already on Scottish & Southern and had zero interest in saving 26p per year on my energy bill)

Re:The reason

[ihtoit]

that's... impressive, I didn't figure on France having much in the way of hydro

Biodiesel

[gesker]

What about products from $ff and $regi ?

Those silly french...

[erth64net]

My Smart ForTwo 450 gets 61MPG (that's US Miles Per Gallon), while running on B20. With almost 70,000 miles so-far, its NEVER belched visible smoke, and the exhaust smells like fryer oil. As an aside, my little car's CO2 output is actually lower per-mile than even an all-electric Tesla...so that's good enough for me.

Re:Why Not phase out gasoline?

[MightyYar]

I am perfectly willing to revisit the issue when the events you predict take place :) I have no dog in this game, I'm just a mechanical engineer who looked into diesel when I helped built a race car (for the endurance), and again every time it comes time to replace my own car (for the potential cost savings).

Re:I call BS, source: compare jetta

[MightyYar]

MPG is misleading for diesels, because diesel fuel contains more energy (and more carbon!). So burning a gallon of diesel is worse than burning a gallon of gasoline. Once you account for the increased diesel energy density, the engines are perhaps 10% more efficient in real-world use. But then there is a weight penalty, which lowers this efficiency. For an 18-wheeler, it is still worth it - diesels traditionally last longer and a trucking company will easily recoup the additional cost over the lifetime of the vehicle. For the average personal car, it would take years, if ever, to recoup the cost unless you drive a lot or live in a country which penalizes the cost of gasoline or subsidizes diesel. With the current $3/gallon gas in the US, neither a hybrid nor a diesel is economical unless you run a taxi service or something.

'only available as an automatic'

[smittyoneeach]

only available as an automatic

Because of perceived/actual lack of market.
Hence the fact we'll be shopping from the factory, and ordering what the customer wants #FTW.

Re:The reason

[Alioth]

It's over 100% because the %age shown on the site (if you read the FAQ) is %age of domestic demand. If production is >100% it means they are exporting power.

Re:I call BS, source: compare jetta

[Alioth]

If the roads are very much from safe, why is the UK's road safety record so much better than most other developed countries?

Re:What Maker ???

[I'm New Around Here]

I have never had this problem and I have been to stations up and down the state of California. None had gloves.

Good for you. I've pumped diesel a few times, and the pump handles usually smell of it. There must have been some diesel on them. Which meant my hands then smelled of diesel, because there were not disposable gloves to wear.

I've never had that experience with gasoline pumps. I don't know why only one fuel type would have the problem. But there it is.