Winsor Crosby wrote:
> There must be diesels and diesels. I have read a couple of comparison
> tests between high fuel efficiency gasoline models, VW TDs and
> hybrids. The VW diesels seem to be the worst of the lot, slower than
> the other two options and worse fuel efficiency. In this country with
> diesel fuel out pricing gasoline and a Toyota Echo getting more miles
> per gallon(only in the high thirties) there seems to be no argument
> for diesel cars at all even assuming I could buy one in California
> where the diesel is not clean enough to be sold.
Cite? This has not been my experience at all. I can point to sources
which confirm that hybrids often don't come close to their EPA
mileage figures. Of the ten vehicles on the EPA's list of 2006
fuel-economy leaders, the _only_ non-diesel/non-hybrid there is the
Toyota Corolla (presumably because the Echo has been discontinued in
favor of the untested Yaris; the Honda Fit and Nissan Versa aren't
on the list, either).
There's also more to a vehicle than acceleration. It irks me that
Toyota, for example, makes side airbags optional when test results
show that their presence in some models makes a big difference in
the safety of the occupants. Total cost of ownership is a sizable
difference, too: hybrid owners are placing a big bet on that
expensive battery pack on a car that cannot be serviced everywhere.
It's one reason why hybrid residual values/expected resale values
aren't close to what used diesels command. And then there's the car
itself. Between a Civic, a Jetta, a Prius, and a Yaris, I know which
one I'd rather be in if an accident were inevitable.
When I bought my first diesel, fuel cost around 90 cents a gallon
(around 19 Euros per liter). It's nowhere near that now, so the
return on investment pushes way out. For many drivers, neither a
diesel nor a hybrid make economic sense. But diesel (especially once
ultra-low-sulfur diesel fuel is common in the U.S.) is one of the
surest, fastest ways to improve the mileage people get in cars
they're not likely to give up anytime soon.
Steve
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