Great! More practical fuel-efficient choices for the US market. The difference with clean diesels is that they offer both superior performance and increased fuel economy over gasoline-electric "hype-brids."

And VW will offer this in a useful wagon version no less!

This brings the SUV misnomer to light: there's nothing "sporty" about and SUV, and as far as "utility" is concerned, most modern wagons have more interior room and thus "utility" than our ubiquitous SUVs.

If only the domestics will catch on.

Nice overall design. I don't see any commercial interest in this in the USA. However a diesel EuroVan would give the DC Sprinter some competition.

I really like this car. A fun to drive, fuel efficent car, if it were reliable it would be perfect. but it's a VW, not necessarily a bastion of reliablity.

Why cant we have a fun to drive reliable car thats fuel efficient? Toyota has reliablity and fuel effiencey but they're boring, VW has fun and fuel effiency but no reliablity. Two out of three is bad.

Assuming the diesel version makes it to the U.S. (which seems a pretty good bet), this will almost certainly be my next car. My Maxima is just about eight years old now, so the timing couldn't be better.

If I have calculated this right, the conversion factor is 241.86/liters, which equals 46.5 miles per gallon.

They really call this thing the Variant? What's next, the Deviant?

@ Michel -

you're right, a TC GDI petrol engine does achieve good fuel economy. For the US market, it may make more sense for vehicles of this size. Diesels do still enjoy advantages for larger vehicles, though.

@ doggydogworld -

"Variante" is German for a particular variation of a theme. VW has abbreviated that to "Variant" for the full wagon versions of its sedans and hatchbacks. They might want to think about what they want to call them in the US, where traditional station wagons lost market share first to minivans and later to SUV/CUVs.

Overall diesels have about half the servicing costs of their petrol
cousins , I have a 2 litre BMw diesel and my wife a 1.4 VW petrol
my car does twice the mileage of hers and yet costs half the money
to service.
However diesels stink , and whatever the manufacturer all seem to
emit clouds of smoke under hard acceleration.

Why not toss the turbo? Because turbo-charging is ideal for diesels, since diesels do not have to limit air intake as is required by gas engines with octane being a limiting factor. Turbos give them huge amounts of boost; increase fuel economy and performance simultaneously and add to the refinement of a modern, diesel engine. Without direct-injection, which is also very suitable for diesels since they can take as much injection pressure as can physically be applied without octane as a limiting factor, and turbo-charging, diesels would be quite wimpy.

Why not apply hybrid technology? Well, they can, but it's an issue of cost. A diesel cost approximately $1,000 more to build per unit than a naturally-aspired, gas-powered engine (not a thousand more than these new VW TSI engines, however). This is due to the turbo charger and the heavier engine build required to handle all the compression. When you add the $2,500 to $3,500 extra cost of an electric motor and all the synergy technology required for that process, and the added cost of a diesel engine, not many buyers would pay for a diesel hybrid; at least not now.

Peugeot-Citoen is producing a diesel hybrid that is a mid-size, sporty car that gets over 70 mpg. I can't remember the name of the car, but it is very similar to the Ford Reflex concept vehicle shown at one of the U.S. auto shows. Ford and Peugeot works together on diesel technologies, so this is not surprising.

In the 90s, before we began this hyrdrogen dream, all three U.S. auto companies developed the most fuel-efficient, cost-friendly concept vehicles that they could produce in conjunction with a DoE program (I forget the name of that program), but all three developed a diesel hybrid car.

The charter of PNGV was to have 80 mpg running prototypes by 2004.
PNGV was shutdown in 2001 by Bush Co. The replacement was the Fool-Cell program. Bush's Chief of Staff at the time was former GM exec Andy Card.

There are developments in DME in China:
We see great potential for DME as a clean alternative fuel . The present diesel oil is a major source of air pollution from diesel engine of trucks and busses in large city like Tokyo. The potential market of diesel oil substitute is larger than LPG. DME is one of ideal fuel for diesel engine. DME vehicles were demonstratively manufactured in Japan, China and Korea and their driving test already started. Practical durability fleet test of a DME truck is under going in Japan.

We are pleased to organise a conference on China taking the lead in the DME market in production from coal and Japan and Korea activities.

If you would like to know more on COAL to Syngas to DME developments, join us at upcoming North Asia DME / Methanol conference in Beijing, 27-28 June 2007, St Regis Hotel. The conference covers key areas which include:

DME productivity can be much higher especially if
country energy policies makes an effort comparable to
that invested in increasing supply.
By:
National Development Reform Commission NDRC
Ministry of Energy for Mongolia

Production of DME/ Methanol through biomass
gasification could potentially be commercialized
By:
Shandong University completed Pilot plant in Jinan and
will be sharing their experience.

Advances in conversion technologies are readily
available and offer exciting potential of DME as a
chemical feedstock
By: Kogas, Lurgi and Haldor Topsoe

Available project finance supports the investments
that DME/ Methanol can play a large energy supply role
By: International Finance Corporation

For more information: www.iceorganiser.com

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