Diesel vs Petrol 20 March 2004 at 3:47PM edited 30 November -1 at 12:00AM in Motoring 336 replies 241.7K views

andy88_2

If you used bio-diesel, you could have the nice smell of chip-shop.

feltonblue

On the LPG debate...
I had my car (Renault Laguna 1.8) converted last year, at a cost of £1800. It is true that you lose more MPG than the promoters of LPG like to let on, but I'll still recoup the cost within 30,000 miles which is one year's motoring for me. My previous MPG was around 35-37, and on gas I'm down to 28-30mpg. However, with gas available everywhere for less than 40p, and from Asda and Morrisons for 29.9p it's still well worth it. The other point that no-one seems to have mentioned is that it is more environmentally friendly, which is why it has the current favourable tax treatment. Lots of local and national government vehicles have been converted, and the low tax level was frozen again in the last budget for the next three years.

MarkyMarkD

The "environmentally friendly" claim is a slightly suspect one. LPG is still a scarce, non-renewable, resource, the same as petrol or diesel. It's cheaper to use because the tax is lower - not for any other reason. It's basically a less efficient fuel than diesel.

The only really environmentally friendly fuel for cars would be electric power, generated from nuclear power which, whilst not renewable, is pretty much limitless in the context of current usage levels.

andy88_2

I agree that LPG has little environmental advantage, but people who are interested in having the car converted should consider having it done abroad as the UK seems to have ludicrous over-pricing. You could have a family holiday at the same time from the savings.

Robert5988

Andy88 wrote:

I agree that LPG has little environmental advantage, but people who are interested in having the car converted should consider having it done abroad as the UK seems to have ludicrous over-pricing. You could have a family holiday at the same time from the savings.

Don't the Ferry and tunnel companies ban LPG cars?

carl310166

Robert5988 wrote:

Don't the Ferry and tunnel companies ban LPG cars?

Eurotunnel deffinately does.

feltonblue

MarkyMarkD wrote:

The "environmentally friendly" claim is a slightly suspect one. LPG is still a scarce, non-renewable, resource, the same as petrol or diesel. It's cheaper to use because the tax is lower - not for any other reason. It's basically a less efficient fuel than diesel.

The only really environmentally friendly fuel for cars would be electric power, generated from nuclear power which, whilst not renewable, is pretty much limitless in the context of current usage levels.

I agree that the fuel is non-renewable, and not as efficient as petrol or diesel, but until electric powered cars are widely available and nore practical, LPG does have the advantage of producing far fewer pollutants than petrol or diesel, and so combined with the current tax savings it makes good sense to use it for now.

andy88_2

feltonblue wrote:

, LPG does have the advantage of producing far fewer pollutants than petrol or diesel,

LPG fuel consumption and consequent emission of CO2 are almost twice as high as diesel. If LPG cars were taxed similar to all other ones, on CO2 emissions, then they would be the most highly rated.

Phil_rich

Did no one see Fifth gear last night? They did a comparison of driving two cars of the same spec but one deisel and one petrol and they calculated that if you did an average of 12000 miles per year you would save £150 per year on your fuel bill.

MarkyMarkD

I haven't seen that programme yet (although my wife probably video'd it for me) but I have to suspect that their figures are under-stating the diesel cost savings.

E.g.

12,000 @ 50 mpg = 240 gallons @ £4.04 = £970

12,000 @ 40 mpg = 300 gallons @ £3.86 = £1,158

So that's at least £188 even taking account of a 4p price differential per litre (about the difference around here at the moment) and assuming exceptionally good petrol mpg.

I'd be interested to see what they call "same spec" as well - often comparisons are of same-sized engines, or same powered engines, ignoring the different way the power is delivered.