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Diesel Market Share In Europe

The market share in Europe of diesel-powered passenger vehicles reached a new high this year. More than 50% of new passenger vehicles registered in were diesels. This compares with (i’m guessing here) about 2% of American vehicles being diesels.

This change will come to America as well, but the holdup is manufacturers waiting for the 2006 changes in fuel regulations and emissions. Once these changes are in place, the use of particulate filters and advanced pollution controls will become possible, as it has in Europe over the past year.

As the article mentions, a diesel engine uses one third less fuel than a comparably sized gas engine. That kind of overall increase in efficiency could substantially reduce our oil consumption as a country.

Hit the jump for some bragging about how much money you could save by driving a diesel.

But you don’t have to wait for 2006 to enjoy a diesel vehicle (if you’d be interested in a VW. I’ve driven approximately 20,000 miles in the past year. At my average 44mpg, I’ve used about 450 gallons of fuel. Let’s say I drove those 20,000 miles in a an SUV that gets 17mpg on average. That’s 1175 gallons of fuel.

Okay, can you see where this is going? To put this into dollars and keep it simple, let’s say that gas and diesel both averaged 1.75 throughout the year.

$2056 on fuel for the SUV.

$787 for my Golf TDI.

I rented a U Haul one day to carry a bunch of crap around and to buy something that wouldn’t fit in my car. We’ll add $40 to my total.

$827.

So, how would you like to save about $1200 a year on fuel? That’s $100 a month. No small potatoes. Even the Passat Wagon TDI, which gets 27/38, you would save $1000 on fuel each year in our above scenario.