Drive dutifully reports the results of a MINI-commissioned survey of 2,018 UK motorists on the subject of diesel cleanliness. Market-research agency YouGov (who me, Gov?) discovered that “diesel-powered cars are thought to be way behind hybrid models for cleanliness.” Those of you equipped with a functional PR BS-detector will immediately note the “thought to be” proviso and the vague “way behind” qualifier. You’ll also fail to be surprised when MINI’s UK brand manager Andy Hearn follows-up this startling factoid by revealing that his employer’s new, oil-burning model generates CO2 numbers that are “identical” to the Toyota Prius’. This despite the fact that “just three per cent believe a diesel vehicle could be considered a low source of carbon emissions.” On the subject of relative levels of particulate matter emanating from diesel and hybrid engined tailpipes, the survey and its PR lackey the Cambridge Evening News showed no interest whatsoever.
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Oh gosh, this just reminds me of what a terrible person I am – I love cars with good gas mileage but I don’t give a rip about emissions. It’s all about economics with me, and I think with other people, too. I think this claimed consumer concern with emissions is overblown and is really the provenance of environmentalists – real people don’t care about emissions, they care about gas money.
I’m sure no-one on TTAC is as stupid as the Germans seem to think everyone else on Planet Earth is, but has anyone noticed a major discrepancy when German compare their “lovely” diesels against a hybrid powertrain?
VW said that their Bluemotion Polo emits 102gm/km2 whilst the Toyota Prius emits 109gm/km2. Now BMW are saying how the Mini Diesel is as “green” as the Prius.
Anyone spot it, yet?
The Germans are comparing small city cars against a mid range family hatchback. If you look at a VW Passat diesel and a BMW 3 series diesel against a Toyota Prius (or Honda Hybrid) the Germans KNOW they’ll come off worse. Why do other car companies want to brow beat a Japanese powetrain? Because it may be superior? Sling a hybrid powertrain in a Toyota Yaris or Honda Jazz and lets have a “apples to apples” comparision! Come on, Germany, what are you waiting for…..?
# KatiePuckrik :
“Sling a hybrid powertrain in a Toyota Yaris or Honda Jazz and lets have a “apples to apples” comparision! Come on, Germany, what are you waiting for…..?”
no no no–come on *Japan*, what are you waiting for!? i want to see a yaris worth buying
Kazoomaloo is correct. Consumers do not care about emissions. They care about costs.
I drive a Diesel. I make my own fuel. Am I doing it to save the planet? Hell no… I’m doing it to save my wallet. There is no coincidence that my serious homebrewing of fuel started in 2004. It costs me under a dollar per gallon to make my own, thankyouverymuch. If I’m saving the planet somehow at the same time, that is just a side benefit.
All this my engine is cleaner than your engine stuff is just corporate weenie waving.
–chuck
http://chuck.goolsbee.org
Consumers do not care about emissions. They care about costs.
It’s not as simple as all that. European consumers care about emissions, in part because Europeans tend to care about these things, and in part because they will be taxed based upon CO2 emissions.
However, diesels in Europe are not taxed on their particulate emissions, so they get a bit of a pass. The climate change created by carbon dioxide emissions is apparently of greater concern than the carcinogenic properties of diesel particulate matter.
American consumers are somewhat cost conscious, but on the whole, seem more interested in “value” (a “fair” price for a good product), safety and reliability. They will happily pay more for a Honda or Toyota than they would for a cheaper GM or Ford product because in the US market where cars are often priced by the monthly payment, value trumps price.
In the luxury segment, they will trade service for reliability if the service takes the sting out of the purchase. Cachet and cushy treatment can also be a form of value.
Fuel economy is clearly not a high priority to Americans. They will willingly trade it for a whole host of factors. Rising fuel prices have encouraged them to downsize a bit, but fuel prices are still not high enough to motivate radical shifts in behavior.
Meanwhile, the Prius handily outsells any passenger car diesel that the manufacturers throw at us, because there is a niche of US consumers who like the idea of owning an electric car that has a range of more than 50 miles. If it was all about saving money, they’d buy the Yaris instead, but that’s clearly not what it’s all about.
NickNick,
I got my points mixed up. What I meant was Germany should compare their mid range family hatcbacks to the Toyota Prius instead of small city cars.
But you are right, if Toyota slung a hybrid powertrain in a Yaris can you imagine the MPG?!
For the record, the Yaris with a normal petrol powertrain is a great car. A hybrid powertrain would only make it better.
I don’t think that many people would pay $18k for a Yaris Hybrid — I doubt that Toyota does, either. A Yaris wasn’t designed for a hybrid powertrain; any effort towards that goal would be a waste of time and money, and since the result would be a four-seat Honda Insight…
” … if Toyota slung a hybrid powertrain in a Yaris can you imagine the MPG?!”
I doubt it would be the big improvement you are implying. The Achilles heel of hybrid powertrains is that they add significant weight to the vehicle and require additional space to put the battery pack, controller and additional powertrain components. Shoving all of this into a subcompact would be a real problem for the space efficiency for which the best of these are known and the added weight would be a more significant portion of the overall vehicle weight. In case you missed that physics lesson, weight (mass) is the enemy of fuel efficiency and performance. Hybrids are always swimming upstream because they are built on the counter-intuitive notion that adding weight and complexity can make the vehicle more efficient. In certain cases this can be made to be true, but the physics cards are stacked against the hybrid player from the get-go.
My point was how false the Germans’ comparision is of their small, diesel city cars are against a mid range family hatchback. It’s a pointless comparision.
Compare a VW Passat/Jetta and a BMW 3 series/1 series against a Toyota Prius and let’s see how good diesels are against a hybrid powertrain……
But the Germans know something else. If you’re going to start comparing the Passat, you’ll not go to the Prius, you compare to what’s actually cross-shopped: the Camry Hybrid, which while a great car, would not be as offset a comparison.
They know that people cross-shop the Mini and the Prius in many markets.
(And as for comparing the 3-series, that’d be up against the Lexus IS hybrid, which at the moment, if I recall correctly, doesn’t exist.)
“MINI Claims Diesel as Clean as a Prius” is a misleading headline/summary. “Clean” with respect to engines means emissions of all sorts; why confuse people by implying that situation when the statistics speak only to CO2 emissions?
SunnyvaleCA : “MINI Claims Diesel as Clean as a Prius” is a misleading headline/summary. “Clean” with respect to engines means emissions of all sorts; why confuse people by implying that situation when the statistics speak only to CO2 emissions?
Because the article is less than crystal clear.
While part of the article is specific to CO2:
Even though the new Mini Cooper D’s output is identical to the hybrid-powered Toyota Prius and lower than the 109g/km achieved by the Honda Civic Hybrid.
It gets less specific here:
Andy Hearn, general manager for Mini UK, said: “Buyers looking for the most efficient cars could be missing out on the fun of driving a Mini. By developing sustainable diesel technology, Mini engineers have proved that you can have a low emissions car without compromising on driving characteristics and style.”
Which emissions?
And again, no specificity here:
These technologies, as well as the variable geometry turbo on the Mini Cooper D, combine to make a torquey, yet economical and low-emitting sports hatch.
Which emissions are low? All? Some? Particulate matter? CO2? Or sound, perhaps?
I recall digging through some interesting little facts and realizing that diesel emissions (NOT just CO2) for a Volkswagen Jetta – itself not even close to the Prius in real world room – ended up to be 17 times what a Prius was. Not even counting particulates. So a whole neighborhood of Prius’s pollute as much real pollution as one VW Jetta diesel…. sad, isn’t it, to misleadingly claim diesel technology is “clean” as a hybrid?
I’m talking unburned hydrocarbons, CO and NOx. I’m talking 2006 cars, here, since the dirty VW was not even available for the 2007 model year. I’m talking 50 state emissions for the Prius vs. 45 state only availability for the 2006 Jetta.
CO2 is 104 gm/km for the Prius, last I checked, not 109. Could be a slight “mistype” on the part of Mini.
I’m sorry to say, my respect for the BMW and Mini organizations took a big hit, today.
Comparing a sub-compact diesel against a mid-sized/family sized hatchback is disingenious, because more and more people are now saying “wow, my friend/brother/colleage has a Prius, and it’s really BIG inside!” – hence, the sales of the Prius continues to grow, despite the “perceived inroads” (read: “Lutz is nuts”) of “hybrids” such as the Chevrolet Malibu – which will gain a net 2 miles per gallon over a 4 cylinder conventional Malibu. Wow. What a lame excuse for a hybrid.
Give me a 100% improvement (Prius) thanks, and I’ll call it good. In fact, I do.
Which emissions are low? All? Some? Particulate matter? CO2? Or sound, perhaps?
I think that you have to put this into context. The EU’s focus is on specifically reducing CO2 emissions, with the goal of reducing average emissions to 120g/km by 2012.
The article above is from an English newspaper, so they will take a decidedly Eurocentric view in discussing this, which means focusing largely on C02. Since European vehicle taxes will based upon C02 emissions, that’s what they’ll tend to focus on.
The Europeans seems unconcerned about doing much about particulate matter. They seem to believe that filtration systems and low-sulfur fuels are enough action on that front. I believe that for Europeans, diesel is seen as a way of not putting all of their fuel consumption eggs in one basket, given that they must import virtually everything they use, and that they lack the military force or popular will to defend their energy sources if that became necessary. It’s a diversification strategy done for political reasons, not for the health of its citizens.
There’s a “new” concern out there in the scientific world, too: Global Dimming.
Last week, I watched a NOVA show on PBS about Global Dimming (follow the link for a slide show).
The scientists bottom line on this is that particulate matter such as those found in jet contrails (and diesel emissions) are adding up to block the amount of sunlight reaching the earth.
The problem is stated as:
…it’s become clear that air pollution can significantly reduce the amount of sunlight reaching Earth, lower temperatures, and mask the warming effects of greenhouse gases. Climate researcher James Hansen estimates that “global dimming” is cooling our planet by more than a degree Celsius (1.8°F) and fears that as we cut back on the pollution that contributes to dimming, global warming may escalate to a point of no return.
That scientist says that the global mean temperature went up in the days following 9/11, when virtually all U.S. aircraft were grounded. However some scientists disagree with the hypothesis.
The NOVA “Dimming the Sun” home page is HERE.
Hey, this Global Dimming seems to be just the ticket!
If I can buy carbon credits to offset my CO2 production, how ’bout getting “Dimming” credits to offset it? Sounds like the earth’s ready for all the particulates we can produce to help cool things back down!
Smokey diesels and backyard garbage burning, here I come!
Only partially tongue-in-cheek, there.
cool! I wish they would import it to the states. I like MIni’s anyway, this would be an added bonus, as well as no doubt tremendous mileage.
I would pass on a hybrid Yaris but bring over the D4D Turbo diesel with the manual tranny and sign me up. Drove one in France for a week and had a ball. Ride and handling were pretty good and it made for an amusing rental.