[pedrocr]

>Diesel is particularly dirty, and burning it in densely populated areas should definitely be phased out.

The latest EU diesel standards for passenger cars are actually on par with the gasoline standards. Don't know what the standards are for heavy trucks though.

[smiley1437]

> The latest EU diesel standards for passenger cars are actually on par with the gasoline standards. Don't know what the standards are for heavy trucks though.

Can we trust any of the big automotive manufacturers to actually meet those standards without cheating?

Look at how widespread the issue is [Dieselgate](https://www.cleanenergywire.org/factsheets/dieselgate-timeli...)

[driverdan]

Yes, because of Dieselgate. There is much more scrutiny now and the costs were high.

[aoner]

Not sure if they learned though

https://www.forbes.com/sites/davekeating/2018/07/26/carmaker...

> The automotive industry says it has cleaned up its act. But this week the European Union’s executive branch, the European Commission, revealed it has discovered a whole new form of cheating – this time on CO2 emission tests. The 2016 scandal concerned air pollution tests on diesel vehicles, where automakers were using so-called ‘defeat devices’ during tests to make the cars seem like they were emitting less pollution. Now, the carmakers are accused of doing the opposite – artificially inflating the level of carbon emissions produced by new cars coming onto the market now. Why would automakers want their cars to look more emissions-intensive than they are? Because a new EU law will require automakers to reduce their fleet average CO2 emissions by 15% by 2025 and 30% by 2030 – based on 2021 levels.

[pedrocr]

They've gamed the tests quite a bit over the years. Yet so far, even after all the scrutiny, VW is the only one that was actually caught cheating. VW is probably enjoying the muddy message everywhere that "everyone does it" but so far only VW has actually been found to be cheating.

[usrusr]

Heavy duty are supposedly cleaner (per unit of fuel) both on paper (standards) and in reality, because manufacturers don't shy away from exposing business customers to the maintenance burden of exhaust treatment systems. But trucking is a border-crossing low-margin business, corners will be cut at every opportunity.