Low Impact

Car blogs and green blogs have been buzzing about Volvo’s preview at Frankfurt of their upcoming C30 diesel model, called “Efficiency”. And it looks to be well-named with a fuel consumption estimated at 4.5 litres / 100km. If those figures are accurate, thats pretty much on-par with the Prius!

What I find particularly interesting about this is the far-out technology they used to achieve these figures… or more accurately, the _lack_ of far-out technology! The C30 Efficiency has no hybrid power train, no special batterypack, and no solar panels. It has an efficient 1.6l diesel engine, paired up with a whole series of incremental, evolutionary features which includes:

• low rolling resistance tyres
• an aero-dynamic shape
• low friction oil,
• better engine-management “smarts”

Given that Volvo have been able to get that impressive fuel consumption with these relatively straightforward techniques, there doesn’t seem to be much excuse for the fuel consumption of comparable cars that can be double or triple that of the C30 efficiency.

Perhaps it’s just a matter of supply and demand – up till now, maybe people have valued raw power and acceleration over fuel efficiency. After all, when you’re driving the 5 km on 50km/hr roads to the shops for milk, its important to be able accelerate from 0 to 100km in under 10 seconds!

If so, maybe Volvo’s new C30 is a sign that manufacturers are beginning to listen to those consumers who are more interested in reducing their impact on both the environment, and with the current price of petrol, their wallets!

Categories: automotive, efficiency, green, reduce, transport