Richard Bremner discusses the merits of Fords Econetic Fiesta versus other forms of ecocars. Are you better off with a really efficient conventional engine, a hybrid or a pure electric car?
Yellowwheels is a broad church. To feature here, a vehicle doesn’t have to have supercar, hot hatch or racing credentials (nor always be yellow!) but has to excite, intrigue or fascinate . The current wealth of new eco cars from startup, as well as traditional manufacturers is fascinating, but with all the hype, are they really what you or I will buy?
We invited internationally renowned motoring journalist Richard Bremner to give his views. He is co-founder/owner of CleanGreenCars.co.uk and is running a special eco version of Ford’s highly regarded Fiesta, the ECOnetic, as a long term test.
Richard Bremner at the wheel of Ford Fiesta ECOnetic
Click green arrows below to listen to sound clips
Tell us about the merit of this car versus other eco cars
Are cars such as this Ford really helping reduce CO2 ?
Read on for full feature and pix
Ford Fiesta ECOnetic
Richard’s journey into London started from his Berkhempstead base, with a run down the A41, joining the M25, then turning east onto the A40. A mixture of 70mph motorway, slow crawl down dual carriageways and urban stop-go, then journey home with a fair amount of back and forth, and idling for the camera left the car reading 52.8mpg. Much higher mpg can be had with a bit of care
Richard Bremner:
Green in the city
escape from the city
So is the Econetic, which costs a not inconsiderable £14,095, worth the extra over a standard Fiesta? That’s slightly difficult to answer because there is no direct non-Econetic equivalent in the Fiesta range, but it looks good value against the less powerful £13,695, 68bhp, 1.4 TDCi Style + diesel five door.”
Click green arrows below to listen to sound clips
Is it worth paying extra for the ECOnetic version of this Fiesta ?
Any disadvantages to running this eco version of a conventional engined car ?
Look out for Richard Bremner’s full long term test and report over on CleanGreenCars.co.uk
photos by Tim Andrew
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I’ll let you off with the Yellow content – the Fiesta look a bit green on my Mac, I guess the white balance is out on you Nikon
Great article, it’s going to be interesting to see how all the different hybrid technologies pan out in the future.
Hehe, yellow is a USP here, but by no means essential to feature!
Re Ecocars: We’re at strange point where the various types are fighting it out in the eco arena. Long term I expect all electric to win, but there are some interesting ideas out there. For instance http://www.itm-power.com have a complete cycle based on generating your own hydrogen and powering modified conventional engines. Fuel cell cars sound like a neat solution waiting for an infrastructure. Critical mass has really only been achieved by the hybrids (Toyota have sold 2 million to date!) but they are surely only an intermediary step towards the goal of low emission useable ecocars.
great about the carbon emissions, but what about the particulate pollution? I understood that diesel, like cooking-fat cars, are NOT really green, they just come up good on CO2?
nice piece – thanks
Diesels are good on CO2 but very poor on air quality (NOx and PM).
While CO2 is a global issue; air quality is what directly impacts human health locally, so arguably it should be the basis for congestion charge exemptions in cities like London, etc, not CO2.
In rough numbers, new Prius emits 96% less NOx than EURO 4 levels demand with virtually no particulate emissions.
In this respect petrol hybrid is much better than diesel, even if the diesels get close on CO2.
Richard Bremner is away in Seoul with limited computer access and has asked us to post this comment on his behalf:
‘Yes, diesels are dirtier than petrol engines in terms of particulates, although this issue is mostly resolved by the growing fitment of particulate filters which the Fiesta Econetic has. Ford’s primary aim with the Econetic models being to deal with greenhouse gas emissions – hence the concentration on improving economy, which is directly linked. Diesels also put out more slightly non-CO2 pollutants than petrol engines because they must comply with less stringent EU emission rules, although this will change when the next set, called Euro 6, come in over the next couple of years. The cost of getting diesel engine’s to meet these rules will almost certainly see the price of diesel-engined cars rise.’
Another interesting viewpointy about the after life of battery cells can be read here too:
http://www.examiner.com/x-7226-Electric-Car-Examiner~y2009m9d8-Lithium-electric-car-battery-pack-can-have-a-useful-second-life
The whole sibject of life after oil is a fascinating one.