Toyota hints at a phase-out of diesel cars
Toyota has hinted at the phase-out of diesel engines after it debuted its new C-HR without a diesel option around the world.
TOYOTA HAS hinted that vehicle updates from now likely won’t include a diesel engine. On its car range. Clearly the decision is based on the recent Volkswagen emissions cheating scandal and the perceived bad press diesel engines have copped in the wake of the scandal.
The Japanese car maker made its decision “within the last six to 12 months” not to fit a diesel engine to the C-HR, because it believed that demand for diesel engines had fallen off, or so suggested Toyota France executive vice president, Didier Leroy who spoke with Reuters.
When asked about other models and dropping diesel engines from them, Leroy suggested the brand “would probably do the same thing”.
Locally, Toyota doesn’t offer any of its passenger cars with diesel engines, so the news is unlikely to frustrate local buyers, but in Europe diesel engines have been available in small cars, like the Corolla.
It will be interesting to watch this space and see if Toyota begins the phase out of diesel engines in its SUV range, following in the footsteps of the C-HR. Indeed, Practical Motoring attended a recent new vehicle launch where the PR boss suggested that diesel engines in passenger cars had had their day as petrol engines were becoming more diesel-like in their power and torque delivery and long-drive thriftiness.
Question: Do you think Volkswagen’s cheating scandal has ruined the diesel engine, or has petrol engine technology become so good as to consign diesel to large SUVs and 4x4s?
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9 Comments
I think the VW scandal has sealed diesel’s fate outside of Europe. Frankly I baulk to sign up to a passenger diesel car, initial cost, complexity, cost, DPF ownership risks and regen characteristics. I trust Toyota hybrid tech, these drivetrains are ultra efficient in the city and seemingly last forever. I would not touch a hybrid from VAG, based on their poor reliablity track record overall.
Nope, nothing to do with that. The French have already announced a ban on diesel vehicles entering Paris from 2020 long before dieselgate. Lot of people saying diesel is the worst thing they have could use for cars, the particles in the soot can get lodged in lung permanently such is their size. They are carcinogenic. Also improvements in petrol engines and hybrids has seen gap narrow in economy, add in the extra weight, and cost diesel makes little sense for most people now. Give me a high revving petrol electric hybrid any day over clackety nose heavy diesel.
Diesel should be limited to tractors.
Petrol should be limited to motorbikes. It will never match the efficiency of diesel. People who think petrol is useful don’t often leave their cities. I wonder if they even leave their houses. Try living in a place where it is several hundred kilometres to the next fuel station.
I’ll never buy a petrol car again.
I do leave the cities and my house mate.
I’ll never buy a diesel car.
I own and drive a hybrid car.
This is very interesting. A few years ago Toyota made a deal with BMW so that BMW provides them with diesel technology and Toyota provides them with Hybrid Technology. At the time Toyota saw the need for diesel to penetrate the European market. How times have changed. In the meantime there have been many factors going against the diesel cause. It appears that unknowingly at the time, BMW has been the big winner with their deal with Toyota, by using hybrid in the 3 Series, the X5, and 7 Series (that I know of in Australia, and possibly other models elsewhere) and the technology would have been helpful with BMW ” i ” electric cars, and the electric future appears to be brighter. There has been a big emphasis on electric cars at the Paris Auto Show with both VW and Mercedes making a big deal about their electric car vision.
The all new 1.2-litre turbocharged petrol engine with 85kW/185Nm for the C-HR is a big step change for Toyota, and possibly will help their sales in Europe. With the C-HR coming here, will this be the first time for a long time that Toyota will have a petrol turbo engine car in Australia since the limited Celica GT-4 and the Supra Turbo when turbos were primarily about performance???
Diesel is dead on city cars. But there’s nothing quite like a diesel when you’re towing a caravan or travelling the outback.
My last 2 cars were diesel, I loved them. FORD FOCUS ’08 6sp Manual first – I’d have bought another if Ford had offered the next model in Manual, sadly only with the doomed PowerShift which jammed on my test-drive which wasn’t impressive. I bought a FORD FIESTA manual. With a mix of 60/40 city/highway, I was impressed with their fuel use – 5.4 for Focus, 4.6 for Fiesta.
I wouldn’t buy a Diesel again if it had a Particulate Filter, given the costs of replacing them. And almost all come with Dual Clutch transmissions which are dreadful to drive in city traffic, and potentially will cost a fortune to fix eventually.
The replacement – a 2016 Prius is so far averaging about 4 l/100km, and it’s also a bigger car than either the Focus or Fiesta – with a lot of great tech (RADAR Cruise particularly!!!).
With the current taxing regime in Europe, using petrol is VERY expensive compared to diesel.
Here, a well-engineered diesel vehicle is a better overall performer than a petrol vehicle. Plus, in some outback areas, diesel is the only fuel available. In many outback areas, Opal is the only petrol product available and I would not use it again after the damage it did to one of my vehicles.