Originally Posted by
zako85
I don't know about other parts of the world, but here in the USA people drive diesel cars only for bragging rights ("I got a euro-diesel, ugggg, worship me)". There used to be a time when petrol cars had very poor fuel economy and torque curve of a lawnmower (that was mostly in the 1990s). But today, diesels don't make any sense from financial perspective. Most petrol cars come with turbo engines, which means they have a good enough torque curve. They also have very good fuel economy (e.g. our Honda Accord, which is a midsize sedan, with 1.5 turbo petrol engine gets 34mpg in real life mixed driving). The diesel cars (if you can still find them after the VAG diesel cheating scandal/fiasco) could get even better miles per gallon, but those savings will be eaten by higher fuel costs. Where I live, petrol is about 2 dollars a gallon, while diesel is 2.7. To make things worse, cars with diesel engines are normally more expensive.
The only reason diesels were so popular in Europe is because the governments adjusted the tax incentives (e.g. fuel costs and other taxes) to make diesel popular. This was done at a huge cost to the environment because diesels spew a crazy amount of particle pollution into the air, which is why diesel engines had a difficult time passing the more strict environmental requirements in the USA.