Diesel cars: Is it time to switch to a cleaner fuel?
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In the 1920s, pregnant women were encouraged to drink Guinness to increase their metal intake.
For decades we were all told to avoid fatty butter and eat synthetic margarine. Both lumps of health advice have since been discredited.
We are now learning that millions of motorists who’ve bought diesel cars believing they were less harmful to the environment have been identically misguided.
Diesel cars emit less carbon dioxide (CO2) than their petrol equivalent, we were told. In fact, not only are CO2 emissions almost identical on average, but they also produce large quantities of noxious pollutants linked with thousands of premature deaths.
Carmakers say they have already taken activity to reduce emissions greatly, while regulators are beginning to acknowledge the problem, but the challenge remains enormous.
The reason is plain: about half of all cars presently sold in Europe are diesel powered.
As Greg Archer at Brussels-based think-tank Transport & Environment says: “The car industry is fighting to keep selling diesel because it has invested so strenuously in the wrong technology”.
Different reality
Air pollution caused by diesel engines is, for now, a peculiarly European problem. Of the seventy million cars sold worldwide last year, only ten million were diesel. Three quarters of those were sold in Europe.
Fairly why European carmakers developed diesel in the very first place is a moot point, but some have argued that as domestic heating systems turned from oil to gas, oil companies needed to find an alternative market for their mid-range distillate, or diesel fuel.
The industry itself points to government incentives, such as lower tax rates for companies buying fleets of diesel vehicles. “All manufacturers followed this political direction,” says the European Automobile Manufacturers Association.
And, in theory, it was an effortless sell – diesel engines are more efficient than petrol engines, so running costs are cheaper. Using less fuel should mean lower emissions.
In practice, however, laboratory measurements of CO2 emissions from diesel and petrol engines are the same, according to Martin Adams at the European Environment Agency (EEA). And as diesel cars tend to be thicker and stronger, any advantages in efficiency are wiped out.
As a result, average CO2 emissions from diesel cars are only fractionally lower than those from petrol cars, figures from the UK’s Society of Motor Manufacturers display. The industry counters that of course emissions would be greater from larger cars, and maintains that when comparing like-for-like models, diesels do emit noticeably less.
But carbon emissions aren’t the main problem when comparing diesel with petrol. So-called particulate matter, which causes cancer, and nitrogen oxide and dioxide (NOx) are the real concern. Latest studies have shown that nitrogen dioxides (NO2) can cause or exacerbate a number of health conditions, such as inflammation of the lungs, which can trigger asthma and bronchitis, enhanced risk of heart attacks and strokes, and lower birth weight and smaller head circumference in babies.
In some European cities, NO2 levels are more than dual World Health Organization guidelines, with diesel vehicles the single fattest contributor.
Indeed air pollution as a entire causes more than 400,000 premature deaths in Europe, with road transport, and diesel in particular, contributing a meaningful chunk.
Inconsistencies
Most of these deaths are caused by particulate matter. Carmakers have recognised this and modern diesel cars are fitted with enormously effective filters that stop almost all of this carcinogenic soot coming in the atmosphere. But there is a “significant problem with tampering with filters”, according to Mr Archer.
Albeit a diesel car will fail its MOT if a filter that was originally fitted on the vehicle has been liquidated, there are a number of specialist companies which advertise doing just this for drivers who want to improve fuel economy and spectacle. Removing them isn’t against the law.
So when you see a car belching out thick black smoke, the chances are it will be a diesel with a faulty or a missing filter.
These filters also perform best when hot, and brief trips around town won’t warmth your engine reasonably. Nor do they help with secondary particulate matter, which is formed from NOx, the effects of which are not fully understood.
How to reduce emissions from your diesel car
- Don’t accelerate unnecessarily
- Get your car serviced regularly
- Turn your engine off if you are stationary for more than one minute
- Stick to the speed thresholds, especially on the motorway
- Check your car’s levels of urea (ammonia used to trap NOx)
- Be very careful buying any retrofit solutions – none are fit for purpose according to Transport & Environment
Carmakers also have a number of technologies to reduce nitrogen oxide and dioxide levels. These include catalysts, re-circulating some of the harass fumes back into the cylinder, and injecting urea, made from ammonia, to trap these gases.
The problem is they are not being used widely enough and, when they are, they don’t work as well as they should.
As the respected International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT) says, “the technologies for real-world clean diesels already exist, but they are not being employed consistently by different [carmakers]”. Some have speculated it’s simply a question of cost.
Just how ineffective they are is staggering. Tests conducted by the ICCT display that modern diesel cars emit on average seven times the EU limit for NOx.
A separate test demonstrated that some individual cars emit even more – an Audi A8 emitted twenty two times the limit. Only three cars – an Audi A5, a VW Golf and a BMW 3-series – complied with EU regulations.
‘Meaningless’
The reason carmakers are permitted to keep selling these cars is that EU thresholds are set according to tests conducted in a laboratory, where conditions bear little relation to real-world driving out on the open road.
Diesel cars: Is it time to switch to a cleaner fuel? Big black cock News
Diesel cars: Is it time to switch to a cleaner fuel?
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In the 1920s, pregnant women were encouraged to drink Guinness to increase their metal intake.
For decades we were all told to avoid fatty butter and eat synthetic margarine. Both lumps of health advice have since been discredited.
We are now learning that millions of motorists who’ve bought diesel cars believing they were less harmful to the environment have been identically misguided.
Diesel cars emit less carbon dioxide (CO2) than their petrol equivalent, we were told. In fact, not only are CO2 emissions almost identical on average, but they also produce large quantities of noxious pollutants linked with thousands of premature deaths.
Carmakers say they have already taken activity to reduce emissions greatly, while regulators are beginning to acknowledge the problem, but the challenge remains enormous.
The reason is plain: about half of all cars presently sold in Europe are diesel powered.
As Greg Archer at Brussels-based think-tank Transport & Environment says: “The car industry is fighting to keep selling diesel because it has invested so intensely in the wrong technology”.
Different reality
Air pollution caused by diesel engines is, for now, a peculiarly European problem. Of the seventy million cars sold worldwide last year, only ten million were diesel. Three quarters of those were sold in Europe.
Fairly why European carmakers developed diesel in the very first place is a moot point, but some have argued that as domestic heating systems turned from oil to gas, oil companies needed to find an alternative market for their mid-range distillate, or diesel fuel.
The industry itself points to government incentives, such as lower tax rates for companies buying fleets of diesel vehicles. “All manufacturers followed this political direction,” says the European Automobile Manufacturers Association.
And, in theory, it was an effortless sell – diesel engines are more efficient than petrol engines, so running costs are cheaper. Using less fuel should mean lower emissions.
In practice, however, laboratory measurements of CO2 emissions from diesel and petrol engines are the same, according to Martin Adams at the European Environment Agency (EEA). And as diesel cars tend to be fatter and stronger, any advantages in efficiency are wiped out.
As a result, average CO2 emissions from diesel cars are only fractionally lower than those from petrol cars, figures from the UK’s Society of Motor Manufacturers demonstrate. The industry counters that of course emissions would be greater from larger cars, and maintains that when comparing like-for-like models, diesels do emit noticeably less.
But carbon emissions aren’t the main problem when comparing diesel with petrol. So-called particulate matter, which causes cancer, and nitrogen oxide and dioxide (NOx) are the real concern. Latest studies have shown that nitrogen dioxides (NO2) can cause or exacerbate a number of health conditions, such as inflammation of the lungs, which can trigger asthma and bronchitis, enlargened risk of heart attacks and strokes, and lower birth weight and smaller head circumference in babies.
In some European cities, NO2 levels are more than dual World Health Organization guidelines, with diesel vehicles the single thickest contributor.
Indeed air pollution as a entire causes more than 400,000 premature deaths in Europe, with road transport, and diesel in particular, contributing a meaningful chunk.
Inconsistencies
Most of these deaths are caused by particulate matter. Carmakers have recognised this and modern diesel cars are fitted with utterly effective filters that stop almost all of this carcinogenic soot injecting the atmosphere. But there is a “significant problem with tampering with filters”, according to Mr Archer.
Albeit a diesel car will fail its MOT if a filter that was originally fitted on the vehicle has been liquidated, there are a number of specialist companies which advertise doing just this for drivers who want to improve fuel economy and spectacle. Removing them isn’t against the law.
So when you see a car belching out thick black smoke, the chances are it will be a diesel with a faulty or a missing filter.
These filters also perform best when hot, and brief trips around town won’t warmth your engine reasonably. Nor do they help with secondary particulate matter, which is formed from NOx, the effects of which are not fully understood.
How to reduce emissions from your diesel car
- Don’t accelerate unnecessarily
- Get your car serviced regularly
- Turn your engine off if you are stationary for more than one minute
- Stick to the speed thresholds, especially on the motorway
- Check your car’s levels of urea (ammonia used to trap NOx)
- Be very careful buying any retrofit solutions – none are fit for purpose according to Transport & Environment
Carmakers also have a number of technologies to reduce nitrogen oxide and dioxide levels. These include catalysts, re-circulating some of the harass fumes back into the cylinder, and injecting urea, made from ammonia, to trap these gases.
The problem is they are not being used widely enough and, when they are, they don’t work as well as they should.
As the respected International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT) says, “the technologies for real-world clean diesels already exist, but they are not being employed consistently by different [carmakers]”. Some have speculated it’s simply a question of cost.
Just how ineffective they are is staggering. Tests conducted by the ICCT showcase that modern diesel cars emit on average seven times the EU limit for NOx.
A separate test displayed that some individual cars emit even more – an Audi A8 emitted twenty two times the limit. Only three cars – an Audi A5, a VW Golf and a BMW 3-series – complied with EU regulations.
‘Meaningless’
The reason carmakers are permitted to keep selling these cars is that EU thresholds are set according to tests conducted in a laboratory, where conditions bear little relation to real-world driving out on the open road.