VW, diesel engines, whats going on?

[odaeio]

Oil depletion mitigation maybe?

I dunno the exact figures, but most of you will know, as far as I remember, one gets substantially more by volume cracking into petrol than diesel, although there is less energy content in petrol.

So, diesel bad, bad, bad - petrol good! Now we switch back to petrol, one can still run his diesel, but it has to be bio, prohibitively expensive etc. Petrol has less energy content, so one needs more of it to travel the same distance as one can on diesel, and fuel tank size runs up against physical restrictions on space required in the vehicle. An HGV on petrol cannot go as far on a tankfull. At the end of the day, in order to be financially viable, the only option is to travel/transport shorter disrances, bring the manufacture/farming of the goods closer to the market!

A brilliant first step to reducing global oil consumption without scaring the shit out of the sheeple - I love it!

[AutomaticEarth]

Yes, I was thinking along the same lines. Most people I know don't give a toss about the emissions of their diesel cars; they just care about how much they cost to run.

Also, don't we have many refineries that can refine diesel now? I guess as far as HGVs and other commercial vehicles go, they'll want to leave these as-is and get everyone else back onto petrol, or hybrid for the up-market motorists.

It'll be interesting to see what happens with electric cars, as most of the criticism of diesel have been with their use in town centres etc.

[PS_RalphW]

For some years I have been expecting diesel prices to rise faster than petrol, because the supply of diesel relative to that of petrol is largely determined by

1. the quality of crude oil available
2. the design of the refinery that processes it

and the global supply of middle grade oil (which generates the highest cut of diesel /heating/ aviation fuel) has already peaked, with very heavy and very light oil (tar sands and shale oil) has still been rising.

However, with the global economy slowing down, the demand for diesel has fallen whilst demand for petrol keeps rising (Outside Europe, most private cars are petrol, and diesel is more used in industry/construction etc.). Hence the price has fallen relative to petrol.

Within the UK I think part of the backlash against diesel is driven by the closure of the last UK refinery that generates most of our diesel consumption, meaning we have to import most of it from overseas refineries, and this is perceived as more of an energy security risk than refining imported oil in our own refineries.

The slow demand growth and low oil prices have also made the extra efficiency and range of diesels less of an issue in the general consciousness of decision makers, although this is a very near sighted attitude.

I personally have been planning to buy an electric car as a second family car, as we currently have both a diesel car and oil fired heating, making me very reliant on one primary source of energy, but until I get another job I can't justify the expense.

[biffvernon]

Diesels are worse for people's health in urban areas but the NOx are trivial in rural areas. Diesels are slightly less damaging from the global warming perspective.

There are swings and roundabouts, but perhaps it's bes not to go to the fair.

[PS_RalphW]

I got a letter today saying my diesel car had one of the cheating engines, so I checked on the manufacturer's website, where you can cross reference the VIN to see if your engine is affected, and the web site says my engine is not affected.

So now I have contradictory answer instead of no answer.

[emordnilap]

I was 'talked' (well, I talked myself as much as anything ) into buying a small diesel car last time we changed.

We get between 1,000 and 1,100 kilometres out of a 44 litre tank. Going back to a petrol (about 500 to 550 from the same size tank) when diesel is considerably cheaper than petrol, will be a dilemma.

(I have other choices of course but life would get much more cumbersome.)

[clv101]

I got a letter today saying my diesel car had one of the cheating engines, so I checked on the manufacturer's website, where you can cross reference the VIN to see if your engine is affected, and the web site says my engine is not affected.

So now I have contradictory answer instead of no answer.

I think this is quite common - I'd trust the VIN/Website and whatever database is behind it.

[PS_RalphW]

I wouldn't. The engine is a 3 cylinder variant with a different engine model number (EA111) which was initially reported as not affected, but later news reports said it was affected after all. I suspect the webs site simply goes on the original engine model number and has not been updated to reflect the latest information.

I have sent an email to Skoda. I am not holding my breath waiting for a reply.

[emordnilap]

Of course, Ireland is the ideal candidate for electric vehicles. Plenty of wind power, a relatively small place, no need for such high speeds, fairly low population.

All we have to do is force manufacturers to up-up-up the battery mileage, combat the nimbys, facilitate more solar and convince people to slow down. Simple.

[biffvernon]

Shaking head in confusion

The head of Volkswagen in the UK has claimed the company’s cars have not emitted any more toxic nitrogen oxides than expected, despite the use of cheat devices which drastically reduced pollution emissions in official tests.

NOx emissions are responsible for 23,500 premature deaths in the UK, according to government data.

Paul Willis, managing director of VW UK, appeared before the environment audit committee (EAC) on Thursday but his denial that there had been more NOx emissions than expected left MPs shaking their heads in confusion. Willis also said he did not know how realistic his ambition was to fix all the 1.2m affected VW cars by the end of 2016.

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/ ... n-expected

[emordnilap]

Shaking head in confusion

The head of Volkswagen in the UK has claimed the company’s cars have not emitted any more toxic nitrogen oxides than expected, despite the use of cheat devices which drastically reduced pollution emissions in official tests.

NOx emissions are responsible for 23,500 premature deaths in the UK, according to government data.

Paul Willis, managing director of VW UK, appeared before the environment audit committee (EAC) on Thursday but his denial that there had been more NOx emissions than expected left MPs shaking their heads in confusion. Willis also said he did not know how realistic his ambition was to fix all the 1.2m affected VW cars by the end of 2016.

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/ ... n-expected

Which actually reads like they expected to be found out.

[Little John]

I'm going to go out on a totally fanciful wing here and speculate the Yanks have created this issue with VW. That is to say, they will have always known of the bullshit about the emissions with VW (and, I dare, say, half of the rest of the manufacturers in the industry). Which, if all true, then begs the question of why the Yanks might wish to seriously damage a German/European company in this way. Could it be something to do with various conciliatory noises coming out of the EU lately vis a vis Russia? In other words, is the issue being faced by VW a kind of punishment beating by the USA at the national/supranationalism level.

[PS_RalphW]

John you are completely left field here. The US is being entirely consistent and logical in coming down hard on VW. In the 1970s and 80s the US seriously cleaned up its act when it comes to consumer visible environmental protection, and the US legal system awards punitive damages (far in excess of the financial harm incurred) by default. It is true that foreign owned corporations tend to get fewer plea bargains accepted, but this has NOTHING to do with geopolitics. VW did this entirely to themselves. The US has always had far stricter NOx controls than Europe, and VW wanted to expand it into the US market, but didn't want to compromise on economy or go to the expense of proper catalytic clean-up.

I fell for the 'clean diesel' PR of the last decade, and bought into this aspect of BAU transport for 5 years longer than I would have done otherwise.

[raspberry-blower]

Contender for most ironic headline of the year award:
Wolf Street: Big VW investors lose shirts, blame lobbying

In 2014, car manufacturers and their trade associations spent more than €18 million lobbying in Brussels. The top three industry spenders are all German manufacturers: Volkswagen, BMW and Daimler. Volkswagen is by far the biggest spender of all, with almost €3.5 million spent in 2014, roughly five times the outlay of the biggest non-German manufacturer, Fiat-Chrysler (€700,000).

€3.5 million a year – that goes a long way in Brussels. But it’s not just money that counts: in terms of personnel, Volkswagen is also miles ahead of its competitors: Daimler has 14 staff lobbying in Brussels. BMW has 8. VW has 43, almost double the other two combined. The highest non-German manufacturer is Honda, with 10 lobbyists.

What all that money and personnel gets you above all is access and influence, reports Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO). A look at Commissioners’ meetings during their first six months in office shows that the car industry met a Commissioner or a cabinet member over twenty times, with three-quarters of these being German manufacturers or trade associations.

Given the coziness of relations between industry and regulators, it’s not much of a surprise that the Commission did absolutely nothing to address the emissions “issue” despite having known for years that actual emissions by cars driven on real roads are much higher than those measured during official laboratory tests.

[PS_RalphW]

http://www.nasdaq.com/video/multiple-vw ... -519166658

Reuters says sources claim that 'multiple different versions' of the cheat device were used over the years in VW diesels, implying more than a few rogue engineers were in on the development.

Only rumour at this stage.