Diesel Seems To Be Having Problems in Europe

[bigdeano]

I ran across this article today. Haven't they cleaned up their diesels like we have? Or maybe they're all VWs cheating on the emissions. Back to gasoline I guess.

Amid smoggy days in London, growing calls to clean up Europe’s toxic air - The Washington Post

 

[daugen]

I think it was only recently London changed their taxi cabs from those ancient relics, kind of like our hanging on to Checker cabs way past their prime.
The old diesels (perkins??) were/are real smokers and stinkers. Look bad, smell bad, mess up the air. And no reason, tech is here to do it cleanly.
But they need to get that fleet of old cabs out, either modern diesels or electric cabs, the latter which make more sense to me in an urban setting.

And for sure you need emission inspections, and until national emissions standards and controls are installed, can't see how the air will get cleaned up.
The question is how far up the weight range do you impose emissions controls? We care about cars, trucks and busses, but maybe not so much a logging truck here or there?

I'd say if you operate your vehicle in an urban area ,it should run cleanly or keep it out of there. That will take a lot of time and money to implement.
Will be interesting to see what China and Mexico do also.

And for sure they should look at their coal burning power plants. Put some better output scrubbers on them. Again, the tech is there, it's all about
who picks up the cost.

I would have thought the EU could do something about this, though with Brexit now, who knows.

 

[Monster5601]

I work in automotive and on specific models that are here for calibration, testing, and some are assembled here. All are for export to Europe and Asia. They can't be sold in North America because they do not meet diesel emission standards.

 

[clemsonfor]

Yea they had the diesel jeep liberty for like a decade before that engine made it here to the US to meet emissions standards with the addition of crap on it.

 

[MHarryE]

Europe has very strict diesel emissions requirements. Depending on country, they also have a very high diesel car population. France, for example, is about 2/3 diesel cars. The UK also has a high diesel population. Soot has been a problem not only for breathing, but also for buildings. Newer cars meet tighter regs - for example when I lived in France my BMW merited a special exemption sticker so I could drive in Paris on pollution alert days. In most countries diesel is taxed at a lower rate and is therefore cheaper than gasoline. With the better fuel economy and lower price per liter, along with better driveability of a diesel engine with manual transmission (Europeans don't like automatics), diesels have been preferred despite higher car prices. European fuel is much better than diesel in America, but still my BMW came with a preferred fuel brand list. For off-highway Europe is now looking at Stage 5 (we name them tiers in America but Europe uses stage) which will require a DPF on every diesel because manufacturers found methods of meeting Stage 4 without DPFs and soot emissions remain a problem.

 

[Industrial Toys]

Did they really meet stage 4, or just pretend?

They say in an urban environment, a Tier 4 Final exhaust may be cleaner then the surrounding air.

A cab may be on the road 24/7. When would you ever charge it, if electric?

 

[JPRambo]

My wife is from France. Her Uncle and cousin visited here in November. They commented that France is transitioning from diesel fuel to gasoline in a lot of the newest cars.