Diesels We Can't Buy in North America

North America has been, let's face it, utterly slow in accepting diesel as an alternate fuel for passenger cars. To the average North American driver a diesel is what powers dumptrucks, farm tractors, and 18-wheeled rigs.

On the other side of the Atlantic where they average automobile driving consumer is somewhat more enlightened, diesels account for about half the passenger cars on the road.

Autobloggreen.com put together a gallery of 10 diesels available in Europe that are not sold here in North America.

Check out some of these numbers:

10) Chrysler Grand Voyager CRD - 9.4L/100km (25 mpg US)
9) Porsche Cayenne Diesel - 9.4L/100km (25 mpg US)
8) Volvo XC60 - 7.6L/100km (31 mpg US)
7) Jaguar XF S Diesel - 6.7L/100km (35 mpg US)
6) Honda Accord Tourer Type-S - 5.9L/100km (40 mpg US)
5) VW CC Blue TDi - 5.6L/100km (42 mpg US)
4) BMW 116d - 4.4L/100km (53 mpg US)
3) MINI Cooper D - 3.9L/100km (60 mpg US)
2) Ford Fiesta ecoNetic - 3.7L/100km (64 mpg US)
1) smart ForTwo CDI - 3.3L/100km (72 mpg US)

From minivans, to SUVs, to luxury sedans, to wagons, to compacts and subcompacts... each of these vehicles is sold in North America (not always the same name, but the same vehicle nonetheless) with a gasoline burning engine that doesn't even come close to the fuel economy of their diesel burning counterparts, and in some cases doesn't even match the performance numbers either.

EVs & Diesels in Detroit

I've been closely following autobloggreen.com for the past couple of days as they cover the eco side of the Detroit International Auto Show. It's pretty cool to see the concepts, but even cooler to see the cars that are actually going to be found in dealer showroom this year.

You can check it out yourself HERE, or click the links below to specific articles.

MB Unveils Concept BlueZero

The Lotus... er, I mean Dodge Circuit
57 Miles Per Gallon Roadster: The BlueSport from VW

More Pics of VW's Diesel Performance Roadster

Audi A3 TDI Coming to US Dealers in '09

ED smart (a poor choice of acronyms)

Fisker Karma & Karma-S (will these ever been seen on a road near you?)

Small Car = Large *****?

Ok, I'll be the first to admit that this isn't truly "newsworthy" in that it's got nothing to do with alternative means transportation, or any new technologies to reduce our dependence on oil, but still... it's worth a laugh!

It's long been maintained that people who drive sports cars and massive (read: useless) SUVs are compensating for something *ahem* that's a little lacking.

Claviné (a natural male enhancement) decided to turn that cliché around and instead point out that men secure enough to drive fuel efficient, small cars (ie: the smart) have no inadequacy to worry about... thanks to Claviné, they would have you believe.

All in all, good for a laugh! (And the only decent excuse to drive around town with a larger than life-sized image of Tera Patrick - who also drives a smart - on all four sides of your car...)

See a few more pics HERE.

Buh-bye Hummers... hello smarts!

It's hard not to laugh at the misfortune of the ill-fated HUMMER brand. They post the highest monthly sales losses by brand every month, GM is desperately trying to sell off the name, and their dealers are closing at an unprecedented rate.

Subsequently, it's impossible not to laugh when one such dealer, the largest HUMMER dealer in the US is not only closing... but is soon going to be selling smart cars instead!

You can read the FULL STORY HERE.

Rallye R.E.A.L.

What: Rallye Énergie Alternative des Laurentides 2008 (or in English: Alternative Energy Rally of the Laurentians 2008) (A "regularity rally" run over open roads with scoring being based on precision of timing and speed, not outright, full-throttle craziness!)

Website: http://www.rallyereal.com/

When: October 2nd, 3rd, & 4th, 2008

Where: Alma, Quebec City, & St-Jerome - Quebec, Canada

Climate change has became a subject of concern whose stake is on the scale of planet. One cannot ignore it, which is why the promotion of alternative means of transport are from now on of crucial importance. The consequences of the massive use of the car in our cities is well known: air pollution, sound pollution, congestion of the downtown areas, accidents, deterioration of the quality of life of the citizens, to name only a few.

Rallye Énergie Alternative des Laurentides 2008 represents the ideal occasion to see various vehicles driven by alternative energies in action at the time of this exclusive rally open to the general public and to help promote other types of energies that that of gasoline.

The rally comprises two stages, over a 2 day period and adding up more than 800 km. The pilots and copilots will have to navigate, and drive their car conscientiously under optimal conditions to obtain minimal fuel consumption while traveling the splendid panoramic route, and to respect the speeds imposed during each test of regularity.

(Translation courtesy of WorldLingo.com & yours truly)

Unfortunately, the 2007 edition was almost exclusively a hybrid affair. There were 2 electric vehicles... one production based, and one home-brew Chevy Cavalier. The rest of the field was made up of Priuses, hybrid Civics & Insights, and 2 hybrid SUVs... a Highlander and an Escape. (Interesting side note: my strictly gas powered, 175 horsepower, sedan can get better highway mileage then either of the EPA ratings for the hybrid SUVs entered.)

This year the event is open to hybrids (yawn - what else?), electrics (Tesla, anyone? Yes please!) as well as vehicles powered by alternative fuels, including biodiesel, natural gas, LPG, etc.

I'm curious how many smarts might be entered this year. The cdi smart can be run on biodiesel, and it puts out a mere 88 g of CO2/km, which is well under the event's regulated limit for biodiesel vehicles of 100 g of CO2/km. And while they don't have a class for gasoline powered high-efficiency vehicles, the regulations state that any car using more than 30% fossil fuels will be limited to 120 g of CO2/km. The petrol powered smart falls under that limit as well.

Sadly I don't own a smart of either type, I can't even come close to affording a Tesla... and since I'll never be caught dead driving a hybrid, I can't enter this event. However if you own a smart cdi and would be willing to hand over the keys and spend the 2 days as a copilot I'd be more than happy to team up. (I'm not holding my breath...)

I'll try to make it into St-Jerome in a few weeks to catch the end of the event and see if anything besides the jellybean snob-mobiles showed up!

Open Your Mind!

And avoid backseats!

Why is it called a 'smart' car?