I want to minimize the amount energy I’ll use commuting back and forth between Boston and Maine. (Say, whatever happened to the railroad?) It’s about 156 miles each way.

The Insight is the smallest and probably the lightest car. I’d bet it’s the most aerodynamic too. On the other hand, the Prius and the TDI are much more pleasant cars in their external appearance and interiors. Also, I can make free biodiesel at the foundation for which I’ll be working.

Emissions to worry about:
Carbon dioxide
Carbon monoxide
Hydrocarbons
Nitrogen oxides
Particulate matter

From a debate here:

From page 53 at
http://www.vv.se/publ_blank/bokhylla/miljo/2002_62/2002_62.pdf
(these are emissions per km, so we’ll need to convert. The blue column is their measurements, the white is what VW specs. To be conservative, I’ll go with the higher numbers - the VW specs).
a Golf TDI emits 0.081 g CO per km, 0.016 g of HC/km, 0.376 g of NOx per km, and 0.029 g of particulates, and 146 g/CO2 per km. To convert to per mile, divide by 0.6, and that gives, for a petro diesel powered Golf TDI, in g per mile:
car________CO________HC_______NOx______CO2_______PM
Golf TDI__0.135____0.0267____0.627_____243______0.483
(diesel)
now, using the biodiesel reductions from
http://www.cityofseattle.net/cleancities/Biodiesel%202.htm
So, the CO will be reduced by 50%, HCs by 93%, NOx will increase by 13%, and PM will decrease by 30%.
So running on biodiesel, we now have:
car________CO________HC_______NOx______CO2_______PM
Golf TDI__0.065____0.0019____0.709______53.46____0.338
(biodiesel)
Now, compare that to a Prius or Insight from http://www.geocities.com/hevo101/impact.htm
car________CO________HC_______NOx______CO2_______PM
Prius_____1.0______0.010______0.02______166____?
Insight___2.1______0.055______0.07______129____?
bioTDI____0.065____0.0019____0.709______53.46____0.338

snip

Here’s the actual certification test results by the NREL.
One of the national labs that does emission testing for the EPA.
actual test results for:
Toyota Prius
Emissions (g/mi)
–HC—-CO—-NOx–CO2
0.009-0.116-0.003-158
PM will be tested in the 2004 Tier-II certification.
Toyota has indicated the actual PM will be about half of the .01g/mi limit.

non-tested results (ie. theoretical) VW Tdi with biodiesel
car________CO________HC_______NOx______CO2_______PM
Golf TDI__0.065____0.0019____0.709______53.46____0.338

Real world VW TDi results with typical dirty diesel, which is the norm everywhere right now until 2006.
car________CO________HC_______NOx______CO2_______PM
Golf TDI__0.135____0.0267____0.627_____243______0.483

Maybe I’ll take the bus.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 23rd, 2005 at 10:27 pm and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.