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It's important to note that popularity of diesel is the doing of the German government. The fuel is subsidized for the sake of the environment because it's more

It's important to note that popularity of diesel is the doing of the German government. The fuel is subsidized for the sake of the environment because it's more efficient. https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.ft.com/content/eb8be120-de5f-11e7-a8a4-0a1e63a52f9c https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.ft.com/content/eb8be120-de5... The situation is similar to Germany's work on its electric power sources. Nuclear was turned off because it's dangerous. Now Germany spews out about same carbon as before giant investments in solar, electricity is four times the price as in US, plus they now have to buy from France cause they don't produce enough. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2017/10/10/why-arent-renewables-decreasing-germanys-carbon-emissions/amp/ https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca...

guardian5x 9y ago
Sorry, but some of your statements are only partially correct. In fact germany exports more energy than it imports. (https://www.ise.fraunhofer.de/en/press-media/news/2016/germanys-electricity-exports-surplus-brings-record-revenue-of-over-two-billion-euros.html https://www.ise.fraunhofer.de/en/press-media/news/2016/germa...) Also the popularity of diesel might have other factors as well.
- yostrovs 9y ago
  Perhaps my view of German energy industry is not detailed, but what are the advantages of diesel engines in cars if not efficiency? Cold starts can be hard, they smell, make a funny sound, slow to accelerate. Maybe maintenance is easier when there are no spark plugs.
  - olex 9y ago
    > slow to accelerate Have you driven a modern diesel? At lower speeds, they easily beat similar-displacement petrol cars off the line with superior torque. They are weaker at high speeds, but in normal (especially city) driving, a diesel is usually faster than a petrol. But yeah, their main factor for popularity is the cost per km. They use less fuel than petrol engines, and the fuel is less expensive (in Germany). This is offset by higher road tax and insurance somewhat, but for commuters and others who drive a lot (>~20000km per year) diesels are a much more cost effective option in Germany than anything else.
    - Svip 9y ago
      Diesel isn't that cost efficient actually, even if you drive a lot. Diesel are more expensive to maintain due to regulations, plus diesel cars tend to be more expensive their petrol counterparts. Moreover, there is depreciation, which tend to be worse for diesel cars, because they are valued less on the second hand market (fairly or unfairly). On average, you should expect to drive at least 150.000+ km before you've broken even on a diesel car with its petrol counterpart. People only look at fuel consumption and fuel prices, but maintenance and depreciation are actually one's biggest loss on a car purchase. And in general petrol comes out on top.
      - YSFEJ4SWJUVU6 9y ago
        Different tax systems can affect the equation even if you disregard that you pay less at the pump for fuel that your car consumes less than a petrol equivalent – lower CO2 figures may also mean that you pay less yearly fees or less taxes on car registration as well. The break-even figure certainly varies by country (as does depreciation of different cars).
      - mywittyname 9y ago
        The premium of diesel engines over petrol is one of the key reasons that we don't get many in the USA (the other issue being emissions). Bob Lutz, former GM CEO, was a big proponent of diesel but repeatedly acknowledged that it doesn't make sense in the USA. The market for people willing to pay the $5,000 premium (in 2007 dollars, mind you) was very small. Americans don't appreciate just how cheap cars in their region are. GM did manage to get a diesel Cruze into the USDM market, and keep it here, but it's low-margin and not a huge seller. A manual diesel Cruze starts at about $25,000 (compared to $17,000 for the base). So it is basically slotted as an "enthusiast" model, just not a high-performance one like Ford and Honda would offer.
      - saiya-jin 9y ago
        What the hell are you talking about? Yes diesels are more expensive, the engine has to withstand much higher pressures internally, so it's made from solid iron rather than aluminium petrol engines (this is common situation, there might be exceptions). You can see it in weight difference - it can be up to 100kg more between similarly-specced engines. Result - you can run a diesel engine for 500,000 km easily, even more but other parts of the car won't usually keep up. Not much support needed apart from changing oil. I didn't have a single issue with my BMW 3l one, drove it for 100k km so far (and bought it with 100k km already), it drives like on my first day. There is a reason why all the buses and trucks have/had them - cheap to run, reliable.
  - morsch 9y ago
    Better efficiency in terms of CO2 emissions. Edit -- sources: https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/es034928d https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/es034928d, https://theconversation.com/fact-check-are-diesel-cars-really-more-polluting-than-petrol-cars-76241 https://theconversation.com/fact-check-are-diesel-cars-reall...
  - teamhappy 9y ago
    > what are the advantages of diesel engines in cars if not efficiency? I wouldn't assume that there's a direct relationship between diesel engines still being around and diesel engines still having an advantage over others. Not having to replace your fleet of trucks, buses, trains or whatever is a big enough advantage for most companies. Also, importing energy from other countries isn't a sign of poor energy production. If buying energy from you costs me less than turning my power plant on for a day I'm gonna shut it down and call it a day. Not to mention the fact that energy prices are sometimes negative (i.e., they pay you for taking it).
    - mywittyname 9y ago
      This x1000. To add a bit, it should also be noted that many of the reliability issues that passenger diesels have are related to emissions equipment. Industrial diesels engines are not required to have all the fickle equipment, so they are generally much more reliable. So buses and trains have significantly longer service lives and lower operating costs than passenger diesels do. Turns out, diesel engines are wonderful when you don't care about emissions.
  - mjh2539 9y ago
    In support of your statement, in comparison to gasoline, diesel costs less to produce, it has more energy per unit of volume, it is much safer to store and use, diesel engines produce more torque at lower RPMs, and yes, vehicle maintenance is less costly over the length of ownership for the vehicle.
    - ableal 9y ago
      > vehicle maintenance is less costly Nowadays with turbos, injectors, particle filters (required in Europe from 2007) and other fiddly bits, it's not clear that diesel engines have an advantage. The particle filters are especially kludgy - most rely on having fuel injected down the exhaust pipe to burn the trapped cinders and regenerate the filter. If you don't run the engine long enough at 2000 rpm or so (to get the right temperature), you may clog the filter and need an expensive replacement. (Worse yet, some designs just use the engine fuel injectors at the "wrong time" to get the piston to expel fuel down the exhaust pipe. This can contaminate the engine oil with diesel fuel and cost a few thousand in repairs, as a colleague learned the hard way ...)
  - MasterPI 9y ago
    > they smell And petrol cars don't smell? > slow to accelerate I think you've never driven a big modern engine diesel car. I have driven this BMW 535d[0] and believe me this monster is not "slow" in any way (0-100km/h in 5.5 seconds). It accelerates faster than the petrol equivalent because of the more torque it produces. [0]http://www.automobile-catalog.com/car/2011/1337945/bmw_535d.html http://www.automobile-catalog.com/car/2011/1337945/bmw_535d....
    - pebers 9y ago
      > And petrol cars don't smell? I at least find the smell of diesel actively unpleasant; petrol isn't something I'd choose to smell all the time but it's still nowhere near as bad.
    - mywittyname 9y ago
      Sure, a big engine diesel is quick, but small-engine ones are slow. The lack of top-end power makes them suffer at highway-speed passing. The diesel Cruze, for example, has a 5% (4mph) lower trap speed at the end of the quarter mile over its gas sibling (with the same 0-60). Also consider that 3.0L I6 diesel has the same 0-60 as a 2.0L turbo four-cylinder Honda Accord, but a huge reduction in highway acceleration (traps 98mph vs. 103mph in the Accord). [0]https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/2017-chevrolet-cruze-hatchback-manual-test-review https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/2017-chevrolet-cruze-ha... [1]https://www.caranddriver.com/chevrolet/cruze https://www.caranddriver.com/chevrolet/cruze [2] https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/2018-honda-accord-20t-automatic-test-review https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/2018-honda-accord-20t-a...
      - Zigurd 9y ago
        Diesels have better torque, which is mostly what feels like "power." Few people travel at top speed, so lower horsepower does not have the same feeling to the driver as high torque.
        mywittyname 9y ago
        Diesels have literally the worst powerband for automobiles, especially mated to automatic transmissions. Diesels have power down low in the RPMs, but that's never where you are when you need power. When you need to accelerate, you floor the throttle and the transmission downshifts into the upper RPMs. They are good for accelerating 0-40, but they are significantly slower at 40+ -- which is where most people accelerate hard, like merging on the highway or passing. When I merge onto the highway, I use 5500-7000rpms, when I don't want to accelerate quickly, I use 2000rpms. It's why I hate driving diesels: 280ft-lbs at 2000rpms is useless and only 105hp; I want 280ft-lbs at 6500rpms (345hp).
  - 72deluxe 9y ago
    I have not had a problem with cold starts with diesels in the decade I've been driving them. I did have a VW Golf with a PD engine but now have a VW with a Common Rail engine. In both cases I prefer them to petrol cars because: a. the torque is great - not slow to accelerate at all. Try one! The PD engine had great low-end torque but the common rail has great torque for the entire power band, which is extensive. Really rapid. Perhaps you were driving an ancient SD-engined vehicle without a turbo?? b. Driving is so smooth; petrol is quicker to respond which is less forgiving. Also, as the engine components are larger and slower moving, they last far longer; my work colleague's 2005 5-series BMW is nearing 250,000 miles and is still supremely fast. (Contrast with a bike engine that goes for 40k or 50k due to high revs?) My 2008 Golf did get smokey but the guy I sold it to has been using the BP cleaning diesel (or the Shell equivalent) and says it doesn't smoke at all any more. I like the sound of them; the non-sporty petrol cars round by me sound like the engine is rattling to pieces (eg my colleague's Vauxhall Astra); with high-performance tuned sports cars then yes the petrol sounds great. I rarely see any V-configuration engines these days. This perspective is from myself in the UK.
  - blensor 9y ago
    Can you please elaborate where you got your data points from. I am a diesel car owner (have been for about 15 years) and I have yet to experience those issues you mention. Currently it has -12°C outside and my car starts just fine.
    - Xylakant 9y ago
      Usually diesel fuel in winter contains additives to prevent freezing/clogging the filter. Some diesel cars also have heated filters. I’ve had a diesel car fail due to a frozen/clogged filter in winter, but that was more like -20. It’s rare, but it happens.
    - scrumper 9y ago
      Back in the late '90s when I got my first diesel (a Citroen AX, with what was at the time the smallest production diesel power plant available) you'd have to wait many seconds for the glow plugs to warm the car before trying to start it. Diesel also freezes in the extreme cold, though that's not really a major issue in the UK. You could also run it on used cooking oil. In the 20 years since then diesels have undergone massive and very rapid evolutionary changes through tax incentives (massively favoring low CO2, high MPG cars) and resulting fleet buying pressures. The result is what we have now: fabulously complicated, precision-engineered common rail engines with multiple turbochargers, incredible efficiency, almost petrol-like smoothness, weird stuff like urea tanks, and instant starting. If you put old vegetable oil in them they would break instantly and expensively. I went from that AX in 1995 to a new Jaguar XJ6 in 2008 (via lots of petrol cars). The only thing they had in common was the black pump. In no other way were those engines comparable; the Jag was a beautiful, torquey, silky, rumbling thing that felt like a big V8, did 1,000 miles on a single tank, and beat 911s off the traffic lights (well, until 30mph). The AX was an agricultural dinosaur that deafened anyone in it and was so nose heavy you'd break a sweat parking it. One of those cars I could and did keep in tune with a hammer and a can of WD-40; the other needed a team of factory mechanics with computers and an expensive annual service. I sold it as soon as the warranty expired, but the AX was running fine until my sister drove it into a parked car shortly before I got the XJ.
      - 9y ago
- Tuna-Fish 9y ago
  Regardless of exporting a lot of electricity, they are also now completely dependent on French nuclear power for energy security. German renewable sources are intermittent. In short, they produce energy when there is enough wind and when the sun shines, and both of those are conditions that correlate heavily over all of Germany. German electricity demand largely does not match them -- unlike in hotter climates, air conditioning is not used much, so demand is negatively correlated with sunshine, and the intermittent capacity greatly exceeds the variable capacity. So today, when it's windy or the sun shines in a clear sky, they have great overproduction, while when neither is true, they depend on foreign sources.
  - bildung 9y ago
    Same difference with nuclear power. Starting and stopping nuke plants is very expensive/inefficient, yet energy demand is fluctuating wildy. That's why there is an international network for transmitting energy. One example is French excess nuclear energy in the summer (in central Europe AC are very uncommon, so energy demand is low when it's hot): Germany can more easily switch off renewable plants and import French nuclear power, yet still is a net exporter.
    - kaybe 9y ago
      In the summer one runs into cooling problems for the plants too. Sometimes they have to be shut off because the river is already too warm - creating problems for France.
  - kazen44 9y ago
    > Regardless of exporting a lot of electricity, they are also now completely dependent on French nuclear power for energy security. most western european nations have a very interdependent energy grid. (more so then the post-warsaw pact countries). The corridor BeneLux, Germany, france and italy is highly integrated. These systems are already reliant on each other, so power dependency in terms of nuclear power isn't really an additional issue.
  - kaybe 9y ago
    >demand is negatively correlated with sunshine No, it's not. Most electricity is used during the day, since that is when the cooking and washing is done. German companies prefer working during days too, although the larger factories will have a shift system. (see eg the plot here: https://www.electricitymap.org/?page=country&solar=false&remote=true&wind=false&countryCode=DE https://www.electricitymap.org/?page=country&solar=false&rem...)
- pelasaco 9y ago
  from 2016 to 2018 the numbers changed for sure
- woodpanel 9y ago
  Sorry, but you're comparing apples with oranges. Germany is "exporting" energy because its ecological agenda is forcing energy companies to buy all green energy that is produced all the time, leading to severe instabilities for the grid. So to keep the German grid from collapsing Germany is dumping its energy into foreign grids, for negative prices even. It has caused the neighbouring countries so much trouble, that most of them installed phase-shifters to block out the German dumping.
  - blau3 9y ago
    That's an inherent problem of non-fossil electricity production. Electrical energy is expensive to store (some hydro plants e.g. in Austria do that). For both nuclear and renewable, the marginal costs for producing an extra MWh, once the plant is built, are close to zero. Because on a market of any commodity, the marginal costs determine the market price, this means that once there is more electricity produced than there is current demand, the price goes to zero. This is actually the realization of the old promise from the fifties that with nuclear energy, energy would be so 'cheap' that it would not be worth the effort to install an electrical meter. The flip side of the coin is that energy production with this cost structure, marginal costs at zero, need some degree of subsidies to be economically interesting for the operators. Renewable energy in Germany is funded by a very visible green energy tax. Nuclear power in turn is expensive to build and was mostly funded by research funds and hidden subsidies. Such as that the final storage of spent nuclear fuel is paid by the state. Extremely expensive but it does not appear in the books of companies.
foepys 9y ago
Stop touting "Germany buys electricity from France because they don't have nuclear power". France always exported electricity because they cannot power their nuclear power plants up and down as easy as others can their coal plants. In hot summers and cold winters France relies on Germany electricity to stabilize their net because nuclear power then becomes a problem.
- xaldir 9y ago
  It is possible to power up and down nuclear power plants, it is however very inefficient. And when you have neighbors wanting to buy your surplus electricity and a grid that support it, why bother? France and other countries (like Switzerland) import electricity from time to time not because they are unable to produce it, but because it's cheaper to do so. Germany on the other hand have to import electricity when there not enough wind/sun and their coal plant are already maxed-out.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - rndgermandude 9y ago
    France in recent years relied on energy imports during winters, because they heat a lot with electricity[1], and e.g. in 2015 they had to temporarily shut down a lot of their nuclear plants due to "quality concerns"[2], tho that was not the first time other European nations had to save them from going dark. Germany mostly has a positive import rate (importing more than exporting) during the summer mornings and evenings, mostly because it's less windy in summers, it's dark so no solar, foreign surplus energy is readily available and cheap so that it doesn't make sense to increase hard coal energy production for a few hours each. But the coal plants are far from maxed out, and Germany does not rely on imports. E.g. during summer mornings when Germany imports about 4 GW to make up for lack of wind and solar, the hard coal plants produce 4-12 GW, meaning to avoid those imports you'd have to run them at 8-16 GW. Those plants alone can produce 19 GW easily, and that's just hard coal. If you like playing with interactive charts about energy production in Germany and the import/export rate, Fraunhofer ISE offers https://www.energy-charts.de/ https://www.energy-charts.de/ PS: Since 2006 up until now, Germany had a negative annual import rate (more exports than imports)[3]. And the last month Germany imported (not necessarily had to import) more energy than exported was September 2011. [1] https://energytransition.org/2017/01/france-cant-meet-its-own-power-demand/ https://energytransition.org/2017/01/france-cant-meet-its-ow... [2] http://www.powermag.com/frances-nuclear-storm-many-power-plants-down-due-to-quality-concerns/ http://www.powermag.com/frances-nuclear-storm-many-power-pla... [3] https://www.energy-charts.de/energy.htm?source=all-sources&period=annual&year=all https://www.energy-charts.de/energy.htm?source=all-sources&p... and make sure to enable the Import stuff in the graphs
Zak 9y ago
The first link goes to a paywall for me. Is the fuel subsidized, or just taxed less? The tax on gasoline in Germany is roughly 100% at current prices.
- zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 9y ago
  > Is the fuel subsidized, or just taxed less? What's the difference?
  - Zak 9y ago
    In a big picture sense, they're the same. I think it says something different about intent though. A subsidy says something is essential or desirable. A relatively lower, but still very high excise tax says one thing is disliked less than the other.
    - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 9y ago
      But ... a tax break is a subsidy! And really, there usually is little significance to how the subsidy is paid, it's usually just an artefact of how it developed historically and how things were easiest to implement, potentially depending on psychological factors. I mean, what would the alternative look like? You have to pay the same tax for both, but then can claim back a fixed percentage of the taxes on diesel? On the same form? Or should they have created a separate agency that processes the refunds? There simply is no other sensible way to implement this subsidy, and that's why it is the way it is.
      - Zak 9y ago
        I think jacquesm adequately explained one of the major distinctions: a high tax that's slightly lower than the tax on a competing good does not result in a below-market price. While many of the effects are similar, it is not the same.
        zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 9y ago
tyu100 9y ago
I was in Spain last year for several weeks and it was so depressing how every town viewed at altitude was covered in a pervasive pea soup of diesel smog. The link between German industrial policy/protectionism and environmental disasters like diesel has been known for a while now but European cities in particular will be paying the price for a long time.
- MasterPI 9y ago
  > pervasive pea soup of diesel smog How do you know it's smog caused by diesel? LA has suffered (don't know how is it today) for years from smog and the majority of the vehicles there are petrol. I mean you can't blame it all on diesel.
  - IB885588 9y ago
    Back in those days, gasoline/petrol cars had much worse emissions than they do today. They've since been cleaned up a little when it comes to smog-forming emissions. Diesel hasn't.
- pelasaco 9y ago
  I can imagine how depressed you were. Depressed, I'm here in Germany. brrr
- Zigurd 9y ago
  Many cities in Spain also have large fleets of gas scooters. Scooters have no emission controls.
  - megy 9y ago
    Sure, because they have a tiny amount of emissions compared to a car, which is about 20x the size.
    - Zigurd 9y ago
      http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/science/science-news/10834679/Scooters-pollute-more-than-lorries.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/science/science-news/1083467...
Xylakant 9y ago
Diesel fuel is taxed lower primarily because it’s historically been the fuel for trucks. Using Diesel engines in cars is a comparatively new development.
- usrusr 9y ago
  “Taxing the fuel used by companies is hurting the economy more than taxing the fuel used by personal cars". It's exactly the same reasoning/lobbying outcome that was behind the American (and now historic, I think?) tax advantage of light trucks over sedans. Both then lead to comparable, and in different ways unecological adaptations: diesels in Europe, F-150s stateside.
- stefan_ 9y ago
  And why would anyone want to subsidize fossil fuel road transport when we have electric trains?
  - Noos 9y ago
    They are two different use cases. You need fossil fuel road transport from distribution centers and to the last mile of businesses and homes. I don't think electric will be able to handle that duty yet, and maybe not possibly unless for relatively short distance last-mile stuff.
  - Xylakant 9y ago
    I don’t think we want that. I’m just telling what’s happening.
executesorder66 9y ago
Downvote for using amp links.
0xfeba 9y ago
> Nuclear was turned off because it's dangerous Nuclear was turned off because of FUD.
- lulmerchant 9y ago
  Exactly. It's one of the safest and cleanest forms of energy in the world.
  - gmueckl 9y ago
    Well, in theory perhaps. In practice, a bit of stupidity can make nuclear reactors fail spectacularly. Chernobyl had operators doing stupid things. Fukushima had planners ignore centuries old warnings about tsunamis in the area. I was a proponent of nuclear power for a long time, but I became cautious when I realized that it still involves humans making mistakes. Now I hope that the German reactors hit their shutdown dates without incident now that all incentive to maintain them properly has been removed by setting those dates in the first place.
    - 0xfeba 9y ago
      Yeah, but as I'm sure you heard before, newer reactors are really well-designed. I think the low death rate per kWh, effective risk to the environment, and carbon footprint are all clearly in favor of nuclear. The downsides: cost, time to operation, and ramp up/down times. But none of those have large negative externalities. Compared to the negatives of conventional power plants, I really think we should be subsidizing nuclear heavily to mitigate climate change -- in addition to renewables.
      - gmueckl 9y ago
        No matter how much you put your emphasis on the technology, this does not make the human factor go away. Reactors are too complex to build and run without human supervision and maintenance. Thus, incidents and accidents based on human error will happen eventually. Also, you leave out one aspect of nuclear power generation: really long term storage is required for the fission waste products. This has its own troubles and unsolved problems. An old salt mine in Germany was converted into an experimental long term storage facility for nuclear waste. Originally, the site was judged to be geologically stable enough to contain the waste for a couple of millenia. However, it turns out that the amount of water that was seeping through was underestimated badly. Now, they are scrambling to get the waste back out. But noone has an idea how to do this safely with badly corroded, damaged and burst containers down there. No other site has been selected for another attempt to put radiating materials into a safe long term storage. In other words, no spent fuel rod has been put into any kind of long term storage yet.
blau3 9y ago
> It's important to note that popularity of diesel is the doing of the German government. The fuel is subsidized for the sake of the environment because it's more efficient. https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.ft.com/content/eb8be120-de5.. https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.ft.com/content/eb8be120-de5.... That's not true. Diesel was a byproduct of gasoline production, which was cheaper because in less demand. This is changing slowly. > Now Germany spews out about same carbon as before giant investments in solar, electricity is four times the price as in US, plus they now have to buy from France cause they don't produce enough. That's disinformation. Germany has a high and growing percentage of renewable power, and it exports electricity - for example, frequently to France, especially in the summer, because scarceness of cold river water to cool the french nuclear plants. Then, renewable energy in Germany is subsidized to some degree, a subsidy which is paid by a small percentage on the bill of private households. On the other hand, there are numerous companies which are except from this tax. Also, every time there is an oversupply of wind or solar energy, the price at the energy spot market goes to zero. In the net result, companies are paying much less for energy. And what you also are leaving out of the equation: Renewable energy is now cheaper than nuclear. There is only one nuclear power project in the EU, Hinkley Point in Britain, and it is becoming increasingly clear that the whole project is likely to make a net loss. I guess the only thing that keeps it alive are the nuclear weapons ambitions of the UK government.

guardian5x 9y ago

Sorry, but some of your statements are only partially correct. In fact germany exports more energy than it imports. (https://www.ise.fraunhofer.de/en/press-media/news/2016/germanys-electricity-exports-surplus-brings-record-revenue-of-over-two-billion-euros.html https://www.ise.fraunhofer.de/en/press-media/news/2016/germa...) Also the popularity of diesel might have other factors as well.

yostrovs 9y ago
Perhaps my view of German energy industry is not detailed, but what are the advantages of diesel engines in cars if not efficiency? Cold starts can be hard, they smell, make a funny sound, slow to accelerate. Maybe maintenance is easier when there are no spark plugs.
- olex 9y ago
  > slow to accelerate Have you driven a modern diesel? At lower speeds, they easily beat similar-displacement petrol cars off the line with superior torque. They are weaker at high speeds, but in normal (especially city) driving, a diesel is usually faster than a petrol. But yeah, their main factor for popularity is the cost per km. They use less fuel than petrol engines, and the fuel is less expensive (in Germany). This is offset by higher road tax and insurance somewhat, but for commuters and others who drive a lot (>~20000km per year) diesels are a much more cost effective option in Germany than anything else.
  - Svip 9y ago
    Diesel isn't that cost efficient actually, even if you drive a lot. Diesel are more expensive to maintain due to regulations, plus diesel cars tend to be more expensive their petrol counterparts. Moreover, there is depreciation, which tend to be worse for diesel cars, because they are valued less on the second hand market (fairly or unfairly). On average, you should expect to drive at least 150.000+ km before you've broken even on a diesel car with its petrol counterpart. People only look at fuel consumption and fuel prices, but maintenance and depreciation are actually one's biggest loss on a car purchase. And in general petrol comes out on top.
    - YSFEJ4SWJUVU6 9y ago
      Different tax systems can affect the equation even if you disregard that you pay less at the pump for fuel that your car consumes less than a petrol equivalent – lower CO2 figures may also mean that you pay less yearly fees or less taxes on car registration as well. The break-even figure certainly varies by country (as does depreciation of different cars).
    - mywittyname 9y ago
      The premium of diesel engines over petrol is one of the key reasons that we don't get many in the USA (the other issue being emissions). Bob Lutz, former GM CEO, was a big proponent of diesel but repeatedly acknowledged that it doesn't make sense in the USA. The market for people willing to pay the $5,000 premium (in 2007 dollars, mind you) was very small. Americans don't appreciate just how cheap cars in their region are. GM did manage to get a diesel Cruze into the USDM market, and keep it here, but it's low-margin and not a huge seller. A manual diesel Cruze starts at about $25,000 (compared to $17,000 for the base). So it is basically slotted as an "enthusiast" model, just not a high-performance one like Ford and Honda would offer.
    - saiya-jin 9y ago
      What the hell are you talking about? Yes diesels are more expensive, the engine has to withstand much higher pressures internally, so it's made from solid iron rather than aluminium petrol engines (this is common situation, there might be exceptions). You can see it in weight difference - it can be up to 100kg more between similarly-specced engines. Result - you can run a diesel engine for 500,000 km easily, even more but other parts of the car won't usually keep up. Not much support needed apart from changing oil. I didn't have a single issue with my BMW 3l one, drove it for 100k km so far (and bought it with 100k km already), it drives like on my first day. There is a reason why all the buses and trucks have/had them - cheap to run, reliable.
- morsch 9y ago
  Better efficiency in terms of CO2 emissions. Edit -- sources: https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/es034928d https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/es034928d, https://theconversation.com/fact-check-are-diesel-cars-really-more-polluting-than-petrol-cars-76241 https://theconversation.com/fact-check-are-diesel-cars-reall...
- teamhappy 9y ago
  > what are the advantages of diesel engines in cars if not efficiency? I wouldn't assume that there's a direct relationship between diesel engines still being around and diesel engines still having an advantage over others. Not having to replace your fleet of trucks, buses, trains or whatever is a big enough advantage for most companies. Also, importing energy from other countries isn't a sign of poor energy production. If buying energy from you costs me less than turning my power plant on for a day I'm gonna shut it down and call it a day. Not to mention the fact that energy prices are sometimes negative (i.e., they pay you for taking it).
  - mywittyname 9y ago
    This x1000. To add a bit, it should also be noted that many of the reliability issues that passenger diesels have are related to emissions equipment. Industrial diesels engines are not required to have all the fickle equipment, so they are generally much more reliable. So buses and trains have significantly longer service lives and lower operating costs than passenger diesels do. Turns out, diesel engines are wonderful when you don't care about emissions.
- mjh2539 9y ago
  In support of your statement, in comparison to gasoline, diesel costs less to produce, it has more energy per unit of volume, it is much safer to store and use, diesel engines produce more torque at lower RPMs, and yes, vehicle maintenance is less costly over the length of ownership for the vehicle.
  - ableal 9y ago
    > vehicle maintenance is less costly Nowadays with turbos, injectors, particle filters (required in Europe from 2007) and other fiddly bits, it's not clear that diesel engines have an advantage. The particle filters are especially kludgy - most rely on having fuel injected down the exhaust pipe to burn the trapped cinders and regenerate the filter. If you don't run the engine long enough at 2000 rpm or so (to get the right temperature), you may clog the filter and need an expensive replacement. (Worse yet, some designs just use the engine fuel injectors at the "wrong time" to get the piston to expel fuel down the exhaust pipe. This can contaminate the engine oil with diesel fuel and cost a few thousand in repairs, as a colleague learned the hard way ...)
- MasterPI 9y ago
  > they smell And petrol cars don't smell? > slow to accelerate I think you've never driven a big modern engine diesel car. I have driven this BMW 535d[0] and believe me this monster is not "slow" in any way (0-100km/h in 5.5 seconds). It accelerates faster than the petrol equivalent because of the more torque it produces. [0]http://www.automobile-catalog.com/car/2011/1337945/bmw_535d.html http://www.automobile-catalog.com/car/2011/1337945/bmw_535d....
  - pebers 9y ago
    > And petrol cars don't smell? I at least find the smell of diesel actively unpleasant; petrol isn't something I'd choose to smell all the time but it's still nowhere near as bad.
  - mywittyname 9y ago
    Sure, a big engine diesel is quick, but small-engine ones are slow. The lack of top-end power makes them suffer at highway-speed passing. The diesel Cruze, for example, has a 5% (4mph) lower trap speed at the end of the quarter mile over its gas sibling (with the same 0-60). Also consider that 3.0L I6 diesel has the same 0-60 as a 2.0L turbo four-cylinder Honda Accord, but a huge reduction in highway acceleration (traps 98mph vs. 103mph in the Accord). [0]https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/2017-chevrolet-cruze-hatchback-manual-test-review https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/2017-chevrolet-cruze-ha... [1]https://www.caranddriver.com/chevrolet/cruze https://www.caranddriver.com/chevrolet/cruze [2] https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/2018-honda-accord-20t-automatic-test-review https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/2018-honda-accord-20t-a...
    - Zigurd 9y ago
      Diesels have better torque, which is mostly what feels like "power." Few people travel at top speed, so lower horsepower does not have the same feeling to the driver as high torque.
      - mywittyname 9y ago
        Diesels have literally the worst powerband for automobiles, especially mated to automatic transmissions. Diesels have power down low in the RPMs, but that's never where you are when you need power. When you need to accelerate, you floor the throttle and the transmission downshifts into the upper RPMs. They are good for accelerating 0-40, but they are significantly slower at 40+ -- which is where most people accelerate hard, like merging on the highway or passing. When I merge onto the highway, I use 5500-7000rpms, when I don't want to accelerate quickly, I use 2000rpms. It's why I hate driving diesels: 280ft-lbs at 2000rpms is useless and only 105hp; I want 280ft-lbs at 6500rpms (345hp).
- 72deluxe 9y ago
  I have not had a problem with cold starts with diesels in the decade I've been driving them. I did have a VW Golf with a PD engine but now have a VW with a Common Rail engine. In both cases I prefer them to petrol cars because: a. the torque is great - not slow to accelerate at all. Try one! The PD engine had great low-end torque but the common rail has great torque for the entire power band, which is extensive. Really rapid. Perhaps you were driving an ancient SD-engined vehicle without a turbo?? b. Driving is so smooth; petrol is quicker to respond which is less forgiving. Also, as the engine components are larger and slower moving, they last far longer; my work colleague's 2005 5-series BMW is nearing 250,000 miles and is still supremely fast. (Contrast with a bike engine that goes for 40k or 50k due to high revs?) My 2008 Golf did get smokey but the guy I sold it to has been using the BP cleaning diesel (or the Shell equivalent) and says it doesn't smoke at all any more. I like the sound of them; the non-sporty petrol cars round by me sound like the engine is rattling to pieces (eg my colleague's Vauxhall Astra); with high-performance tuned sports cars then yes the petrol sounds great. I rarely see any V-configuration engines these days. This perspective is from myself in the UK.
- blensor 9y ago
  Can you please elaborate where you got your data points from. I am a diesel car owner (have been for about 15 years) and I have yet to experience those issues you mention. Currently it has -12°C outside and my car starts just fine.
  - Xylakant 9y ago
    Usually diesel fuel in winter contains additives to prevent freezing/clogging the filter. Some diesel cars also have heated filters. I’ve had a diesel car fail due to a frozen/clogged filter in winter, but that was more like -20. It’s rare, but it happens.
  - scrumper 9y ago
    Back in the late '90s when I got my first diesel (a Citroen AX, with what was at the time the smallest production diesel power plant available) you'd have to wait many seconds for the glow plugs to warm the car before trying to start it. Diesel also freezes in the extreme cold, though that's not really a major issue in the UK. You could also run it on used cooking oil. In the 20 years since then diesels have undergone massive and very rapid evolutionary changes through tax incentives (massively favoring low CO2, high MPG cars) and resulting fleet buying pressures. The result is what we have now: fabulously complicated, precision-engineered common rail engines with multiple turbochargers, incredible efficiency, almost petrol-like smoothness, weird stuff like urea tanks, and instant starting. If you put old vegetable oil in them they would break instantly and expensively. I went from that AX in 1995 to a new Jaguar XJ6 in 2008 (via lots of petrol cars). The only thing they had in common was the black pump. In no other way were those engines comparable; the Jag was a beautiful, torquey, silky, rumbling thing that felt like a big V8, did 1,000 miles on a single tank, and beat 911s off the traffic lights (well, until 30mph). The AX was an agricultural dinosaur that deafened anyone in it and was so nose heavy you'd break a sweat parking it. One of those cars I could and did keep in tune with a hammer and a can of WD-40; the other needed a team of factory mechanics with computers and an expensive annual service. I sold it as soon as the warranty expired, but the AX was running fine until my sister drove it into a parked car shortly before I got the XJ.
    - 9y ago
Tuna-Fish 9y ago
Regardless of exporting a lot of electricity, they are also now completely dependent on French nuclear power for energy security. German renewable sources are intermittent. In short, they produce energy when there is enough wind and when the sun shines, and both of those are conditions that correlate heavily over all of Germany. German electricity demand largely does not match them -- unlike in hotter climates, air conditioning is not used much, so demand is negatively correlated with sunshine, and the intermittent capacity greatly exceeds the variable capacity. So today, when it's windy or the sun shines in a clear sky, they have great overproduction, while when neither is true, they depend on foreign sources.
- bildung 9y ago
  Same difference with nuclear power. Starting and stopping nuke plants is very expensive/inefficient, yet energy demand is fluctuating wildy. That's why there is an international network for transmitting energy. One example is French excess nuclear energy in the summer (in central Europe AC are very uncommon, so energy demand is low when it's hot): Germany can more easily switch off renewable plants and import French nuclear power, yet still is a net exporter.
  - kaybe 9y ago
    In the summer one runs into cooling problems for the plants too. Sometimes they have to be shut off because the river is already too warm - creating problems for France.
- kazen44 9y ago
  > Regardless of exporting a lot of electricity, they are also now completely dependent on French nuclear power for energy security. most western european nations have a very interdependent energy grid. (more so then the post-warsaw pact countries). The corridor BeneLux, Germany, france and italy is highly integrated. These systems are already reliant on each other, so power dependency in terms of nuclear power isn't really an additional issue.
- kaybe 9y ago
  >demand is negatively correlated with sunshine No, it's not. Most electricity is used during the day, since that is when the cooking and washing is done. German companies prefer working during days too, although the larger factories will have a shift system. (see eg the plot here: https://www.electricitymap.org/?page=country&solar=false&remote=true&wind=false&countryCode=DE https://www.electricitymap.org/?page=country&solar=false&rem...)
pelasaco 9y ago
from 2016 to 2018 the numbers changed for sure
woodpanel 9y ago
Sorry, but you're comparing apples with oranges. Germany is "exporting" energy because its ecological agenda is forcing energy companies to buy all green energy that is produced all the time, leading to severe instabilities for the grid. So to keep the German grid from collapsing Germany is dumping its energy into foreign grids, for negative prices even. It has caused the neighbouring countries so much trouble, that most of them installed phase-shifters to block out the German dumping.
- blau3 9y ago
  That's an inherent problem of non-fossil electricity production. Electrical energy is expensive to store (some hydro plants e.g. in Austria do that). For both nuclear and renewable, the marginal costs for producing an extra MWh, once the plant is built, are close to zero. Because on a market of any commodity, the marginal costs determine the market price, this means that once there is more electricity produced than there is current demand, the price goes to zero. This is actually the realization of the old promise from the fifties that with nuclear energy, energy would be so 'cheap' that it would not be worth the effort to install an electrical meter. The flip side of the coin is that energy production with this cost structure, marginal costs at zero, need some degree of subsidies to be economically interesting for the operators. Renewable energy in Germany is funded by a very visible green energy tax. Nuclear power in turn is expensive to build and was mostly funded by research funds and hidden subsidies. Such as that the final storage of spent nuclear fuel is paid by the state. Extremely expensive but it does not appear in the books of companies.

foepys 9y ago

Stop touting "Germany buys electricity from France because they don't have nuclear power". France always exported electricity because they cannot power their nuclear power plants up and down as easy as others can their coal plants. In hot summers and cold winters France relies on Germany electricity to stabilize their net because nuclear power then becomes a problem.

xaldir 9y ago
It is possible to power up and down nuclear power plants, it is however very inefficient. And when you have neighbors wanting to buy your surplus electricity and a grid that support it, why bother? France and other countries (like Switzerland) import electricity from time to time not because they are unable to produce it, but because it's cheaper to do so. Germany on the other hand have to import electricity when there not enough wind/sun and their coal plant are already maxed-out.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- rndgermandude 9y ago
  France in recent years relied on energy imports during winters, because they heat a lot with electricity[1], and e.g. in 2015 they had to temporarily shut down a lot of their nuclear plants due to "quality concerns"[2], tho that was not the first time other European nations had to save them from going dark. Germany mostly has a positive import rate (importing more than exporting) during the summer mornings and evenings, mostly because it's less windy in summers, it's dark so no solar, foreign surplus energy is readily available and cheap so that it doesn't make sense to increase hard coal energy production for a few hours each. But the coal plants are far from maxed out, and Germany does not rely on imports. E.g. during summer mornings when Germany imports about 4 GW to make up for lack of wind and solar, the hard coal plants produce 4-12 GW, meaning to avoid those imports you'd have to run them at 8-16 GW. Those plants alone can produce 19 GW easily, and that's just hard coal. If you like playing with interactive charts about energy production in Germany and the import/export rate, Fraunhofer ISE offers https://www.energy-charts.de/ https://www.energy-charts.de/ PS: Since 2006 up until now, Germany had a negative annual import rate (more exports than imports)[3]. And the last month Germany imported (not necessarily had to import) more energy than exported was September 2011. [1] https://energytransition.org/2017/01/france-cant-meet-its-own-power-demand/ https://energytransition.org/2017/01/france-cant-meet-its-ow... [2] http://www.powermag.com/frances-nuclear-storm-many-power-plants-down-due-to-quality-concerns/ http://www.powermag.com/frances-nuclear-storm-many-power-pla... [3] https://www.energy-charts.de/energy.htm?source=all-sources&period=annual&year=all https://www.energy-charts.de/energy.htm?source=all-sources&p... and make sure to enable the Import stuff in the graphs

Zak 9y ago

The first link goes to a paywall for me. Is the fuel subsidized, or just taxed less? The tax on gasoline in Germany is roughly 100% at current prices.

zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 9y ago
> Is the fuel subsidized, or just taxed less? What's the difference?
- Zak 9y ago
  In a big picture sense, they're the same. I think it says something different about intent though. A subsidy says something is essential or desirable. A relatively lower, but still very high excise tax says one thing is disliked less than the other.
  - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 9y ago
    But ... a tax break is a subsidy! And really, there usually is little significance to how the subsidy is paid, it's usually just an artefact of how it developed historically and how things were easiest to implement, potentially depending on psychological factors. I mean, what would the alternative look like? You have to pay the same tax for both, but then can claim back a fixed percentage of the taxes on diesel? On the same form? Or should they have created a separate agency that processes the refunds? There simply is no other sensible way to implement this subsidy, and that's why it is the way it is.
    - Zak 9y ago
      I think jacquesm adequately explained one of the major distinctions: a high tax that's slightly lower than the tax on a competing good does not result in a below-market price. While many of the effects are similar, it is not the same.
      - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 9y ago

tyu100 9y ago

I was in Spain last year for several weeks and it was so depressing how every town viewed at altitude was covered in a pervasive pea soup of diesel smog. The link between German industrial policy/protectionism and environmental disasters like diesel has been known for a while now but European cities in particular will be paying the price for a long time.

MasterPI 9y ago
> pervasive pea soup of diesel smog How do you know it's smog caused by diesel? LA has suffered (don't know how is it today) for years from smog and the majority of the vehicles there are petrol. I mean you can't blame it all on diesel.
- IB885588 9y ago
  Back in those days, gasoline/petrol cars had much worse emissions than they do today. They've since been cleaned up a little when it comes to smog-forming emissions. Diesel hasn't.
pelasaco 9y ago
I can imagine how depressed you were. Depressed, I'm here in Germany. brrr
Zigurd 9y ago
Many cities in Spain also have large fleets of gas scooters. Scooters have no emission controls.
- megy 9y ago
  Sure, because they have a tiny amount of emissions compared to a car, which is about 20x the size.
  - Zigurd 9y ago
    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/science/science-news/10834679/Scooters-pollute-more-than-lorries.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/science/science-news/1083467...

Xylakant 9y ago

Diesel fuel is taxed lower primarily because it’s historically been the fuel for trucks. Using Diesel engines in cars is a comparatively new development.

usrusr 9y ago
“Taxing the fuel used by companies is hurting the economy more than taxing the fuel used by personal cars". It's exactly the same reasoning/lobbying outcome that was behind the American (and now historic, I think?) tax advantage of light trucks over sedans. Both then lead to comparable, and in different ways unecological adaptations: diesels in Europe, F-150s stateside.
stefan_ 9y ago
And why would anyone want to subsidize fossil fuel road transport when we have electric trains?
- Noos 9y ago
  They are two different use cases. You need fossil fuel road transport from distribution centers and to the last mile of businesses and homes. I don't think electric will be able to handle that duty yet, and maybe not possibly unless for relatively short distance last-mile stuff.
- Xylakant 9y ago
  I don’t think we want that. I’m just telling what’s happening.

executesorder66 9y ago

Downvote for using amp links.

0xfeba 9y ago

> Nuclear was turned off because it's dangerous Nuclear was turned off because of FUD.

lulmerchant 9y ago
Exactly. It's one of the safest and cleanest forms of energy in the world.
- gmueckl 9y ago
  Well, in theory perhaps. In practice, a bit of stupidity can make nuclear reactors fail spectacularly. Chernobyl had operators doing stupid things. Fukushima had planners ignore centuries old warnings about tsunamis in the area. I was a proponent of nuclear power for a long time, but I became cautious when I realized that it still involves humans making mistakes. Now I hope that the German reactors hit their shutdown dates without incident now that all incentive to maintain them properly has been removed by setting those dates in the first place.
  - 0xfeba 9y ago
    Yeah, but as I'm sure you heard before, newer reactors are really well-designed. I think the low death rate per kWh, effective risk to the environment, and carbon footprint are all clearly in favor of nuclear. The downsides: cost, time to operation, and ramp up/down times. But none of those have large negative externalities. Compared to the negatives of conventional power plants, I really think we should be subsidizing nuclear heavily to mitigate climate change -- in addition to renewables.
    - gmueckl 9y ago
      No matter how much you put your emphasis on the technology, this does not make the human factor go away. Reactors are too complex to build and run without human supervision and maintenance. Thus, incidents and accidents based on human error will happen eventually. Also, you leave out one aspect of nuclear power generation: really long term storage is required for the fission waste products. This has its own troubles and unsolved problems. An old salt mine in Germany was converted into an experimental long term storage facility for nuclear waste. Originally, the site was judged to be geologically stable enough to contain the waste for a couple of millenia. However, it turns out that the amount of water that was seeping through was underestimated badly. Now, they are scrambling to get the waste back out. But noone has an idea how to do this safely with badly corroded, damaged and burst containers down there. No other site has been selected for another attempt to put radiating materials into a safe long term storage. In other words, no spent fuel rod has been put into any kind of long term storage yet.

blau3 9y ago

> It's important to note that popularity of diesel is the doing of the German government. The fuel is subsidized for the sake of the environment because it's more efficient. https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.ft.com/content/eb8be120-de5.. https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.ft.com/content/eb8be120-de5.... That's not true. Diesel was a byproduct of gasoline production, which was cheaper because in less demand. This is changing slowly. > Now Germany spews out about same carbon as before giant investments in solar, electricity is four times the price as in US, plus they now have to buy from France cause they don't produce enough. That's disinformation. Germany has a high and growing percentage of renewable power, and it exports electricity - for example, frequently to France, especially in the summer, because scarceness of cold river water to cool the french nuclear plants. Then, renewable energy in Germany is subsidized to some degree, a subsidy which is paid by a small percentage on the bill of private households. On the other hand, there are numerous companies which are except from this tax. Also, every time there is an oversupply of wind or solar energy, the price at the energy spot market goes to zero. In the net result, companies are paying much less for energy. And what you also are leaving out of the equation: Renewable energy is now cheaper than nuclear. There is only one nuclear power project in the EU, Hinkley Point in Britain, and it is becoming increasingly clear that the whole project is likely to make a net loss. I guess the only thing that keeps it alive are the nuclear weapons ambitions of the UK government.