Viewpoint
The air pollution issues associated with diesel have been well-publicised, but new technologies and approaches – and a focus on core markets — might be its saviour, says Bill Visnic
Start talking car-business “big-picture” with engineers and once you hash out autonomy for the thousandth time, the discussion invariably comes to diesel. Is diesel over and done with?
Everyone knows the Volkswagen impact, which for now has caused diesel compatriots BMW and Mercedes-Benz to almost completely withdraw diesel models from US showrooms. The VW scandal generated plenty of still-fomenting blowback in Europe, too.
But even with pressure from ongoing gasoline-engine design innovations — Mazda has announced it is ready to launch a production compression-ignition gasoline engine in 2019, for example, and there’s a growing menu of electrical enhancements — diesel doesn’t quite look dead. After all, what car company can turn its back on 40% thermal efficiency that comes as easy as falling out of bed in the morning—bundled with the customer-pleasing torque a hybrid can’t hope to match?
Ford powertrain chief engineer Pete Dowding is talking the talk, at least. He concedes that diesel is battered at the moment, but he sees a strong, high-volume truck market where diesel is still a magic word. Ford truck buyers, he said, are hungry for the coming 3.0-L V6 diesel for the F-150 this spring. And after an emissions-scandal scare of its own, Fiat Chrysler sold the EPA on an emissions-system reprogramming and FCA’s Ram brand is back in business with its popular diesel for light-duty pickups (as well as the Jeep Grand Cherokee).
But there’s no denying the diesel pandemic that Volkswagen started in the U.S. has bled out to Europe and even the famously diesel-worshipping continent has picked up the torches to pursue the Frankenstein monster. Several large cities have outright bans on the books or in play. Britain and France took a larger view, proposing to prohibit all internal-combustion vehicle sales by 2040.
Even in Germany, the cradle of all things compression-ignition, diesel might be losing not just the perception war, but the battle with fast-moving electrification technologies, too. Late summer saw German automakers in a desperate-looking gambit to tweak the engine-management software of up to 5 million vehicles to bring oxides of nitrogen (NOx) output in line with today’s Euro 6 regulations. Oh, and a €500-million fund to improve urban air quality.
Seemingly calling for a return to reason, BMW Chairman Harald Krüger said, “For almost two years now, diesel technology which is cutting-edge, highly-efficient and popular with customers has been deliberately and publicly discredited. This has caused tremendous uncertainty among millions of drivers and it’s not going to get us anywhere.”
Indeed, Germany Inc. is working hard to protect the diesel, not only from short-sighted political knee-jerk but also from the expanding notion that battery-electric technology is ready for high-volume primetime. Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel was quoted in September by Bloomberg as saying the onus is on the country’s entire auto sector to “address unforgivable mistakes,” but she stressed, “that doesn’t mean we have to rob the whole industry of its future.”
Dr Rolf Bulander, chairman of Robert Bosch Mobility Solutions, told journalists at an August media event that he sees the diesel as a core power source for passenger vehicles beyond 2025.
“What is amiss when Paris, Madrid, Athens and Mexico City decide to ban diesel vehicles from their streets from 2025? In our view, this is ecologically misguided—or, at best, environmental protection from a ‘blinkered’ perspective. Blinkered if only because such driving bans ignore diesel’s outstanding efficiency, which is still needed to limit global warming. But, also, blinkered because it underestimates the potential still latent in this technology.”
All well and good. But there’s no question diesel’s emissions-perception problem isn’t going away. The answer: rather than run from it, embrace it.
Leave it to Honda, perhaps, to adopt exactly that approach. The engine experts there recently boasted that the new European-market 1.6-L iDTCI diesel was one of the world’s first engines to be certified under the watch of the newly-adopted Worldwide Harmonized Light-Vehicle Test Procedure (WLTP). A crucial component of the WLTP is data input modelled from on-the-road emissions testing widely known as real-world driving emissions (RDE).
Yes — the very same scrutinizing that exposed VW’s cheating.
Honda carefully admits its new diesel achieved its exceptional RDE results with some slick engine-design enhancements and “a new NOx Storage Converter (NSC) system with larger catalysts and a higher content of noble metals (silver, platinum and neodymium) that store nitrogen oxide gas until the regeneration cycle.”
If you’re reading “added cost,” go to the head of the class.
But until after-treatment expense can be reduced or a combustion innovation improves engine-out emissions, the best thing the industry can do is to keep bragging about acing those new RDE tests.
“Future mobility will definitely depend on state-of-the-art diesel as well,” BMW’s Krüger declared.
I agree. But just to be on the safe side, get cracking on the next big diesel breakthrough, car industry. Do it not because it’s easy, but because it’s hard.
Bill Visnic is editorial director for the Society of Automotive Engineers. This article was originally published by FISITA, the international federation of automotive engineers, on its blog, and is reproduced by permission.
Diesel is kaput, no need to save, improve, “clean”, but abandon it. The car manufacturers who cannot or don’t want to move on from ICE will not make it. My bet is they will not make it by 2030. The future of mobility, both human and cargo, is electric or predominantly electric, as there will be other forms of clean, sustainable transportation.
Diesel does not have an emission perception problem, but a pollution and climate change reality problem. Fossil fuels must remain in the ground, if we are to restore a livable planet in Anthropocene, so it is not a matter of tinkering with ICE, but make the necessary technological leap.
What is the latest announcement from Fiat, for instance? Is Ferrari challenging BMW and their diesel lock-in? No, they are challenging Tesla, as they see it as the trend-setter, not Germany Inc. Fiat’s management has gotten the message, belated as it is. Time for the rest of ICE manufacturers to do the same.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-01-16/ferrari-has-plans-to-make-an-electric-supercar-marchionne-says
“After being skeptical for years about the speed of introducing alternative engines and new technologies, Marchionne said in an interview before this week’s Detroit show that the time is right for a shift in the industry. Marchionne reckons, for example, that by 2025 fewer than half the cars sold will be be fully combustion-powered, as gas and diesel give way to hybrid, electric and fuel cell drivetrains.”
Yeah. This, exactly. The ICE is a dinosaur that needs fossilising.
I completely agree. Lets move on from fossil fuels as soon as possible.
Banning and penalizing diesels because of NOX and particulate pollution is causing a rise in CO2 levels. This is like treating a patient for a broken leg while they are bleeding to death. While we want to eliminate as much pollution as possible, isn’t it CO2 that’s the major problem? By the way, a new study by the Materials, Science, and Technology Laboratory in Switzerland has found that direct-injection gas engines actually emit more particulates than diesel.
While European diesel engine suppliers may be no longer offer in the U.S., it is surely time that a very heavy volume of Law be dropped on reactionary red-neck ‘coal-rollers’ who fit their vehicles with intentional polluting equipment to intimidate drivers of hybrids? Do they not realise that they have to breathe the same limited atmosphere as the rest of humanity- unless of course they don’t qualify?
Reminds me of the “perceived” threats of nuclear power. If you tell a lie often enough then people will believe it which is happening with diesels at the moment so the powers that be can roll out their own agenda such as electric. Believe me electric power will be shown to be more polluting than diesels if you take in the battery and electricity production not to mention the extraction of all the specialised metals etc that will be required to keep the electric vehicles going.
The cost to the environment of electric vehicles will cost the earth, yes ICE is not perfect, but, electric is much worse. Just because you don’t see the spoil heaps in the UK doesn’t mean they don’t exist. Extraction of the rare earth metals used in high performance batteries requires large areas of land, land that after extraction is contaminated by the chemicals used in the extraction. Then the materials require processing, more chemicals more pollution. Then once fitted to a vehicle will require charging, you’ve guessed it more pollution. If the motoring public of the UK all drove electric cars in 30 years time, I doubt the infrastructure could cope. No, diesel and petrol are not perfect, but are they really as bad as we are made to believe?
Just as a point of accuracy, batteries don’t contain rare earth metals. Typically they contain lithium and cobalt or nickel. Electric motors contain rare earths in their magnets; primarily neodynium.
Lanthanum is a REE used in NiMH batteries, that aside the EV’s still require rare earth elements and metals
When are all these so called ‘experts’ who promote electric only going to admit that the pollution caused by the generation of the power, the manufacture of the batteries, and the extraction of minerals for the batteries and motors has to be included in an overall ‘pollution rating’ for EV’s? A true comparison based on full life-cycle of the vehicle is the best way to judge the merits of each for us ‘ordinary’ people. I’m in agreement with Chris above unless someone can prove otherwise to me.
Yes, exactly. And when you consider that the life of the battery will determine the life of the car itself, the battery electric car really is an environmental disaster in the making. The reason air quality is becoming an increasing issue is the amount of wood and refuse being burnt in our urban areas. Pollution from cars is almost insignificant by comparison – in fact, in some cities, the exhaust gases from Euro 6 diesel or petrol cars is actually less toxic than the air entering the air cleaner.
The day may ultimately dawn when ICE’s are forgotten and resigned to the history books, but we are a long way from that yet. The pollution of our present modes of transport is literally killing us all, whether that be in cities, towns or wherever, we all breathe the same air. Control of emissions is the start of the process with ever tightening targets for our car manufacturers to achieve, they will be forced to retire the ICE one day but not before they have come up with an alternative. In the meantime the infrastructure needs to be addressed to allow more and more electric vehicles to enter the competition. Electricity generation is not pollution free even with nuclear power stations.
Electric cars are the product of idealism over common sense, so beloved of the ruling classes to whom money is no object. The diesel-engined car is a triumph of modern engineering in terms of efficiency, pollution and reliability: it is even capable of substantial improvements as shown in recent articles here.. The electric-car will develop and eventually reach the same standards no doubt, but in the next decades the diesel offers reliable, low cost motoring to the masses that is far off with electric cars (charging points, power stations to supply these and development of batteries are all needed).
I would love to see all non-electric engines banned from town centres, but the transport infrastructure is lacking in most UK towns, outside of London of course and delivery waggons are essential.
About 90-95% of remaining particulate emission of both diesel and gasoline engines could be eliminated by the use of a 0.5-1.0% (or less) hydrogen inclusion with intake air. Hydrogen is not meant for replacement on a BTU per BTU basis with the hydrocarbon fuel, but rather, it does drastically improve cylinder combustion such that the flame front keeps up with the piston during the power stroke, resulting in near 100% complete burn of the fuel injected, rather than sending it unscathed (a fraction of injection) into the exhaust header. Of course, some compensation of oxygen sensor has to be made during active hydrogen injection, or the sensor will start adjusting oxygen flow upwards needlessly. Many tests have been run using hydrogen, and the savings of approximately 30% of fuel without hydrogen has been proven already.
One of the best ways of getting this hydrogen is the ACE cell. It has a nearly pure hydrogen stream, using a catalytic carbon, cast iron anode and cathode, and uses alternating current.
Fumigation can certainly improve combustion in older diesel engines, but I suspect it is of little benefit to more modern units and fumigation requires far more than the few hundred ml a minute of gas produced by things like the “ACE cell” which are just snake oil.
The solution based on the same principal, uses gas boosted diesel running where, as with hydrogen assistance the point of injection is during the cycle. This technology has been around for years. Independent testing over the years shown it to reduce particulates by 90% and reduce nox as well as improve fuel consumption because of improved torque. It has always been dismissed as to complex, an extra tank to fill!!!
Spot on – “The Engineer” please talk and support https://www.cgon.co.uk – they are doing great things with hydrogen assisted combustion. The reality is you only need a very small amount of ‘The right hydrogen’ to make the biggest difference in emissions.
None of the comments so far address the showstopper for complete migration to electric propulsion in the near to medium term. The best energy density achieved by the current crop of battery chemistries is still barely adequate. To achieve the barely adequate requires the use of lithium batteries that contain cobalt. There is not enough cobalt produced in the world to manufacture the batteries that would be required. Also, the argument for using a cradle to grave impact assessment to determine the benefit of a technology is compelling. A factor that has not yet been mentioned is that lithium batteries cannot be economically recycled at end of life – landfills full of strategic materials anyone?
The future of the Diesel engine will be ultimately dependent upon the success or failure in the development of battery technology to give an environmentally friendly,safe, cost effective and energy dense solution. If the proposed electrification of our road transport fails on any of these factors, Diesel engines will have the opportunity to endure as a viable option.
Polution ‘black-spots’ are tackled most effectively by creating low-emmision zones, not by blanket vehicle emission limits. Current Diesel exhaust after-treatment can/does reduce the emissions to the levels achieved by Petrol.
I think the biggest challenge comes from the Paris Climate Agreement where significant reductions in CO2 (by reducing our dependance on fossil fuels) is required. Alternative fuels that are sustainable, sufficiently abundant, safe and cost competitive are required. We need to see if the fuel producers can meet this challenge, if not, the demise of the Diesel (and the I/C engine in general) will be inevitable.
If this does not kill off the I/C engine then the government ban on the their sale from 2040 will.
Wonder what will happen in the 2 biggest I/c engine countries (Germany and USA) who have taken little or no interest in the climate-change hype so far in terms of engines?
The crucial words in your reply are ‘so far’.
Electric car’s take two is what this is. It was tried 100 years ago and so was electified buses etc in towns and cities around the world. Most of the time we only look at the initial set up cost of these things without taking into account the maintainance cost of the infrastructure needed and finally the real killer the TAX that is collected by goverments across the globe from the ICE cars. Currently it is slightly more economical for users of the EVs but it will come to an break point when the goverments will have to TAX the EVs too or shut down social services etc. Without this benifit the cost will be too high for most users of cars. Hybrid cars though that with a small non lituium engergy store that is just when breaking and accelerating to reduce the consumtion now that is the way to go.
The main problem is the engergy that to weight ration that exists but also the distrubution of the engergy. With liquid fuels we have a good system for this which is flexible and when you can refil a car to give you 1200miles (yes that is what you can get with Diesel cars) in 5-6minutes how are you going to do the same for EVs?
So diesel is broken and electric is the saviour of the planet! NO, electric vehicles will be proved to be just (if not more) polluting than the diesel.
Battery and motor materials mining
Lithium batteries once past a useful recharge life will require expensive recycling or more likely land fill (lithium can explode when wet!).
Then there is the out of city or should that be London power generation. I think people may take a different view of electric vehicles when a nuclear power station is built in their back yard so that the well to do who can afford an EV can pretend they’re green.
Don’t get me wrong, the ICE is not perfect, but the ‘holier than thou’ attitude of the EV exponents will end up costing the planet dearly, re Chris above.
There is also another pollution produced by all vehicles, bicycles included, and that is fine rubber particles. these are very fine and can affect the respiratory system in a similar manor as PM10s. The heavier the vehicle the more there is of this pollution and EVs are generally heavier than their ICE counterparts.
Ford announces $11bn hybrid and EV expansion
https://www.theengineer.co.uk/ford-11bn-hybrid-ev-expansion/
Volkswagen plans electric option for all models by 2030
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-41231766
I have read the above comments with amusement. It is the old establishment at it again, the world is flat and that is that, the flat earther’s are alive and active. The answers to the issues raised in the comments have already been invented, but not fully developed, but inventors are denied the funds required to fully develop these inventions. An example is the Gemini Electric Motor details at: http://www.geminielectricmotor.com An electric motor that can use either an electronic controller or a carbon brush commutator to provide forward, reverse, regeneration and a unique frictionless braking system. The biggest problem with electric cars at the moment is that all the existing and proposed new models are aimed at the top of the range high cost models, nobody is making an electric car that competes with the small ICE car market. Not one of the comments mentioned renewable energy, as a source of providing the electricity, or using a lead acid battery, the old electric vans used one hundred years ago, which ran commercially did not use lithium batteries, they use lead acid batteries that worked.
Riversimple are
Here is a truly great breakthrough, leaving fossil fuels in the ground:
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/jan/24/worlds-first-electric-container-barges-to-sail-from-european-ports-this-summer?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
“Dubbed the “Tesla of the canals”, their electric motors will be driven by 20-foot batteries, charged on shore by the carbon-free energy provider Eneco.”
The EV’s will not be rejected because the power grid is carbon-intensive, on the contrary, the scaling up of EVs will lead to a carbon-free grid. It is already happening.
Dr. Rolf Bulander should read the Paris Climate Agreement, that Germany signed and is committed to implement., and the IPCC reports it is based upon. There is no place for fossil fuels in any scenario that keeps the global mean temperature rise below the target of 2deg C over pre-industrial level (which is too high to begin with).
John Patrick: there are small and cheap EV’s on the market, I am driving one, the Pininfarina used by BlueIndy (an EV car sharing service), part of the French Bollore group. I don’t own it, just rent it when I need it for city driving.
The various small number of electric vehicle being tried out is a start, but when you consider that the world sales of new cars in 2017 was approximately 79 million, and that there are over one billion cars on the roads, the fleet of hirer electric cars in Paris of over 2,012 is not going to concern the diesel fuel manufacturer. When you go to buy your next car, and for every ICE or Diesel engine car there is a fully electric car, at the same price or cheaper, which can be recharged using renewable, Wind, Solar or other renewable energy, the choice will be simple. We are going through an energy revolution and the methods of generating that electricity, and whether they are generated at home by micro wind or micro systems or large main generators is still to be played out.
What is important is that actuate information is provided, and not the worst case miss information that is currently being offered.
What is the total life cycle energy cost of say a Tesla versus a Jaguar? Say both complete a 100,000 miles. Include charge leakage over 10 years, and new battery if expected. Anybody?
From Forbes
The Union of Concerned Scientists did the best and most rigorous assessment of the carbon footprint of Tesla’s and other electric vehicles vs internal combustion vehicles including hybrids. They found that the manufacturing of a full-sized Tesla Model S rear-wheel drive car with an 85 KWH battery was equivalent to a full-sized internal combustion car except for the battery, which added 15% or one metric ton of CO2 emissions to the total manufacturing.
However, they found that this was trivial compared to the emissions avoided due to not burning fossil fuels to move the car. Before anyone says “But electricity is generated from coal!”, they took that into account too, and it’s included in the 53% overall reduction.
And it’s probably worth asking what happens to the battery at end of lifecycle. Answer: Tesla recycles it, recovering 70% of the carbon.
Umicore’s factory plants are able to recycle our batteries into completely reusable materials and substantially reduce the carbon footprint of manufacturing Lithium-ion batteries.
The Umicore battery recycling technology is able to save at least 70 percent on CO2 emissions at the recovery and refining of these valuable metals. It does this by creating “products” and “byproducts,” rather than following a mechanical separation process.
Basically Diesel cars are knackered, to reduce their emissions will cost more money and reduce their fuel tank size (bigger ad blue tank required – look at latest VW Passatt), whereas Electric cars will get cheaper and achieve greater range, tipping point will be 2022 for upfront cost. Total cost of ownership is already cheaper for Electric Car compared to a Diesel, taxi company’s already know this and are exploiting it, the higher the miles the bigger the savings.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/quora/2016/04/22/the-carbon-footprint-of-tesla-manufacturing/#1a4f06e26096
“Indeed, Germany Inc. is working hard to protect the diesel, not only from short-sighted political knee-jerk but also from the expanding notion that battery-electric technology is ready for high-volume primetime. Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel was quoted in September by Bloomberg as saying the onus is on the country’s entire auto sector to “address unforgivable mistakes,” but she stressed, “that doesn’t mean we have to rob the whole industry of its future.””
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/jan/29/vw-condemned-for-testing-diesel-fumes-on-humans-and-monkeys
Well, the German Big 3 auto makers found another bottom of unethical, inhumane and possibly illegal behavior in their futile attempt to prove that diesel is “clean”. I find the testing repugnant on any animal, however, since they stand by their product, the executive teams should have volunteered for it.
It was recently reported that there were 700,000 electric cars sold in China in 2017, and due to well documented air pollution issues in China, auto makers at forced to accelerate production of electric vehicles by 2019. It is expected that 2 million electric cars will be sold in China in 2018 and by 2020 the number will reach 3.4 million.
Surely the Germans can see that Diesel engines are a lost cause, and should focus on the new technologies in electric vehicles to stay competitive and keep market share.
Hi, I read the article Electric cars are not the answer to air pollution, says top UK adviser in The Guardian newspaper. It goes on to quote Prof Frank Kelly professor of environmental health at King’s College London and chair of the Committee on the Medical Effects of Air Pollutants, official expert advisers to the government that particulate matter from brakes and tyres has strong links to cardio pulmonary toxicity and tiny pollution particles from brakes in cars was a major issue. While electric vehicles emit no exhaust fumes, they still produce large amounts of tiny pollution particles from brake and tyre dust, for which the government already accepts there is no safe limit. The Royal College of Physicians estimates that 29,000 people die early each year from particle pollution, more than the 23,500 premature deaths attributed to NO2. The combined total is 40,000 because some people are harmed by both pollutants.
Are your readers aware of the Frictionless Electric Brakes, details at : https://contest.techbriefs.com/2017/entries/sustainable-technologies/7459
which completely remove the problem, it is simply the Gemini Electric Motor and Generator, details at: http://www.geminielectricmotor.com which has won gold medals at the worlds largest invention exhibitions in Geneva Switzland and the USA. The Gemini Electric Motor is an electric motor that can move forward, reverse and has regeneration, while it can be made to operate as a frictionless electric brake.
It sometimes takes a little time to appreciate that an electric motor works on the synchronisation of magnetic poles to attract and repel to create movement, forward or reverse. If this synchronisation is reversed to repel and attract, the electric motor will try to remain stationary and resist movement in either direction, creating an effective frictionless electric brake, which never requires relining or produces heat that causes the brakes to fail, for which the government already accepts there is no safe limit. Toxic air causes 40,000 early deaths a year in the UK, in response the environment secretary, Michael Gove, recently announced that the sale of new diesel and petrol cars will be banned from 2040, with only electric vehicles available after that. But faced with rising anger from some motorists, the plan made the use of charges to deter dirty diesel cars from polluted areas a measure of last resort only.
If you would like additional information, please contact me at jpettridge@picknowl.com.au or md@geminielectricmotor.com