Anti-diesel hysteria - should I go for T8 instead?
 

Germans have not only blocked some older diesel cars from driving through cities but now it is extended also to some highways. Even Euro 5 diesel has been affected by this. And I am afraid it will get only worse.

http://www.tellerreport.com/tech/dri...ryjwhP2am.html

I live in Luxembourg but Germany is right across the border and I drive there regularly. I am about to place an order for XC90 D5, which is Euro 6d and should be safe for some time, maybe even years but still. One never knows how crazy german government and green activists will get. And this can quickly spread to other parts of Europe. I plan to keep this car for 5-6 years. I could live without driving through some cities but banned highways would mean a serious complication for me. And another issue is that when I will be selling this car, it might be difficult since it won't be able to drive everywhere.

Now the question is whether to chicken out and go rather for petrol?
Why T8? In my typical day, driving kids to school and commute to work, I drive about 40km. It includes some highway but with 4 tunnels and then regular traffic jams so I usually do not drive fast there and I think I could cover almost the whole day just with an electricity. Overnight I can charge in my garage. So if petrol, T8 is my natural choice because T6 does not make a financial sense to me. I drive about 30.000km/year and only on petrol T8 pays off in 2 years. So big part of my drivings I could do cheap. Plus enjoying 400hp :)
Why D5? But then few times a year I make long trips across Europe and it adds up to maybe 10-15k/year. There I would run out of batteries already on Luxembourg border and then drive another 1000km only on petrol. And I could run into similar problems when trying to sell my T8 car in 6y that batteries will need to be replaced soon, which is probably expensive.

Important to know is that T8 is 7000EUR more expensive than D5. I know I will never get this money back, not on fuel. So I would pay this extra just for more power and for being green (which I do not care much regarding hybrid cars because even the electricity has to be produced somewhere...as long as I can drive wherever I want).

You’re exactly where I was about a year ago or so :) In the end - I opted for a D5. Realistically- diesels cannot be phased out- not in our lifetime anyways, and not by limited-range electric vehicles/PHEVs which require hours to recharge. All commercial vehicles are diesels and we depend on those. Hybrids, in this sense (30kms electric and petrol for the rest of the way..) simply don’t work for long-range driving outside city limits. I need good mpg on long extra urban trips (probably 90% of the total mileage I do annualy..), low end torque and propper AWD (as oppose to the fake 70hp-powered ERAD..). Charger network outside large cities in EU is next to nonexistent, electric range is minuscule due to limitations of current battery technology, charging takes hours, etc, etc. CO2 emissions of PHEVs are usually much higher than comparable diesels, battery materials are toxic and impossible to dispose of in a safe way, plus electric power mostly comes from dirty, non-renewable sources (nuclear, thermo,..) so even the environmental arguments don’t quite stick..

Ofcourse- to each his own.

Then ask yourself the question.....would you buy a used 5 year old hybrid with little or no warranty on the batteries?'

If the price was right , the battery would still have 3 years warranty left , the battery doesn't suddenly fail , the range just drops every year .. and by the time it needed one there will be reconditioning centres around to refurbish them At a "reasonable" price ,possibly with superior cells . Volvo already have one reconditioning centre ..

I have the D5 as I can get the best part of 600 miles (960km) between fuel stops which takes about 5 minutes at my local supermarket.

I drive up to 900 miles (1440km) a week, with about 5 miles of this in towns. I frequently stop at hotels with virtually no chance of charging overnight.

With the T8, I would be filling up every other day and carrying several hundred kg of potentially dangerous batteries around for virtually no benefit. I would be paying about £200 a month extra for this dubious pleasure.

If Volvo move away from diesel, this will be my first and last Volvo.

Volvo are already not making D versions of some of their new models coming out, so Good Bye

Buying a T8 for economy wise is all about how many miles you do a day and is that a lot of motorway? In my opinion there are only 2 reasons why you would not buy one, you cannot afford the difference in price, or you do a shed load of miles on a motorway driving very fast.

So much fake news and myths about batteries, you get an 8 yr warranty for a reason and the warranty is not in place because 8yr and one day they will fail over night. There are cars out there now older than 8 years, over 200k miles and still their battery efficiency is like 92%

I have had my XC60 T8 since end of June, I have done 9k miles and the average over that 9k is 57.6 MPG, most of my journeys are around 10, to 30 miles, but some are like 130 miles, some around 60 miles before a charge, and even then I am getting 45 mpg average on that journey, and fast speeds 45 of those miles duel carriage way / motorway. (I mean Fast as well).

The art of driving a T8 is battery management, that is using the Hold, and Charge button to save the batteries and to charge them, I quite often regenerate 40% of the battery over one journey, so it is all about planning, on most of my journeys that are repetitive I return home with 1 mile or so left on the battery. drive down a 2 or 3 mile down hill section or 4 or 5 miles that is mostly down hill and you can regenerate 3 or 4 or 5 miles of battery to use again, all dependant how often you are using the Regen motor and braking.
I charge the battery every night on off peak electric, and even during the day if I know I have to use the car later in the day again.

I always drive everywhere in B mode.

Now the fun bit, it is a T8 and seriously fast car when you want it to be, handles well with air suspension and Polestar. It truly is a Kitten in Wolfs clothing, that when running on electric so quiet and relaxing.
I am Hooked, and personally I wish I had a full Electric car, and my next car will be a full electric when there is one available that meets my needs of performance and range at a reasonable cost.

In the UK at present there is up to 11p per litre difference in petrol and Derv, it may get far worse in years to come.
In the next few years in the UK there will be no doubt more places you cannot drive a Diesel Car, it can get worse, certainly not better.

Right or Wrong in my opinion I would not get a Diesel of any sort unless I was driving more than 50k miles a year.

In the UK, the price gap between petroleum and diesel is now £0.10 a litre (on average). It’s only a few pence to being 10% more expensive.

Now I have a very eco-friendly commute and average about 57mpgs from my S90 D4 R-Design.

I had the opportunity to commute in a brand new BMW 320i the other day and only just cracked 40mpgs. The way I see it, for my commute, a diesel is still 30% more efficient than a petrol equivalent for me.

I guess the situation changes if taxation of diesels change and the fact I don’t need to access major conurbations in my car helps but if you ask me, diesel has a bright future. The tech exists to make Diesel engines cleaner than petrol. They ain’t going anywhere.

It will be interesting to see how in 5 years time the depreciation rates of a hybrid against a diesel, My money is on a Hybrid, lets face it even on forecourt's today all you see are diesels sitting there for months at really cheap prices because dealers cannot move them.

Certainly if I had to buy a diesel today it would only be on a PCP.

On some other notes, I am getting near 500 miles per tank of fuel due to my Miles per gallon, I love the fact that I am only going into a garage once every 2 to 3 weeks :)
Most of my Driving is done in the dark, and even since the winter and clock change I have not noticed any real difference for mpg so far, in fact I do think it is going up, just depends on the lengths of journey's I do.

Charging times are around 2 1/2 hours from empty to full at the max charge rate, yes at present out side large cities the infrastructure is not in place yet but rapidly growing.

@Haldex, Commercial Vehicles are moving over to petrol in small vans etc, and transit side, all the manufactures are starting to offer petrol versions, mostly because of future bans in cities that are in the pipeline.

I know people who bought vans a few years ago and have to get rid of because the emissions are not met to go into London, vans that are not even 4 years old.

As I said if someone is driving up and down a motorway on a daily basis and staying away from home in Hotels, racking up a huge milage in a year yes diesels are the only option, but as I said for me it has to be at a rate of 50k miles per year to warrant the changes in the next 3 / 5 years. and charges for inner city driving, and risk of a growing price gap between diesel and petrol at the pump, and deprecation of a diesel car against petrol or hybrid.

Diesels cost more to service, and braking down more often according to the industry in general. and if you start to have particular filter issues etc. there could be some expensive bills to the point is it worth repairing.

Regarding comments on AWD for most people who generally do not leave the tarmac in really bad weather it is not a problem, I have drove High Performance AWD cars for the last near 10 years straight off, which in general are more fwd bias and compared to my T8 even in the worse of the rain and flooding we have had lately I would not know the difference between a AWD and FWD, In fact the weight of the T8 in bad flooding and possible aquplanning it is really impressive how sure footed it really is even in fed bias.
I admit I have not drove the T8 in Snow / Ice yet so looking forward to it, but tbh I really do not see a problem, especially since I have winter tyres on it.

I do wonder if I set to pure, and turn off Traction Control if I can get some rear back end fun, which you cannot do in AWD that easy.

For my wife - I’d have a T8 XC60 tomorrow if we could afford one. Sadly, 99% of the population can’t, making the “kill diesels now” argument even harder to swallow.

I’ve never had a diesel break down, they aren’t more expensive to service and the only thing trying to kill diesels is fake news and politicians.