Audi TDI Clean Diesel Ad Campaign Paves Road to Energy Independence

[burn_your_money]

HERNDON, VA - Audi today launched an aggressive public awareness campaign in the U.S. to highlight the ways in which TDI clean diesel can help America achieve energy independence. Ranging from television ads to a social media-driven charitable donation, the campaign will kick off a summer-long push to change public perception of the once-maligned diesel engine.

http://www.fourtitude.com/news/publish/Audi_News/article_5065.shtml

[catlin_cava]

if the R8 came as a TDI i would consider buying one

[jtanguay]

yet they recommend not using bio... 

[theman53]

Now the money for charity needs to go to a fund so they would allow drilling in the arctic national wildlife refuge...

[jtanguay]

Now the money for charity needs to go to a fund so they would allow drilling in the arctic national wildlife refuge...

my dad was exploring the arctic back in the '70s... funding dried up though.  there is definitely oil to be had up there, but the problem is getting it to the refineries.  thank god for global warming though... a lot of the ice is starting to melt

[DCC]

if the R8 came as a TDI i would consider buying one

http://www.rsportscars.com/audi/2008-audi-r8-v12-tdi-concept/

Sadly it looks like they're not building it (at least not now).

[jtanguay]

if the R8 came as a TDI i would consider buying one

http://www.rsportscars.com/audi/2008-audi-r8-v12-tdi-concept/

Sadly it looks like they're not building it (at least not now).

omfg that car is sexy!!!! it looks so futuristic.

[lord_verminaard]

At the TDI cup race last weekend at Mid-Ohio:




Edit, I guess I could post the cars too. 






Brendan

[catlin_cava]

if the R8 came as a TDI i would consider buying one

Its only 141,000$CAD..for the gasser,
http://www.rsportscars.com/audi/2008-audi-r8-v12-tdi-concept/

Sadly it looks like they're not building it (at least not now).

omfg that car is sexy!!!! it looks so futuristic.

[airhead]

The audi TT is available as a TDI. Up until I moved to France, I'd never seen one, but French people are mad for their diesels. I'd say almost half of the cars on the road here are diesel, so its nice to see a diesel powered sports car.

[ezekiel]

The best way for Audi to change to misconceptions of diesels would be to, oh, I don't know, actually sell them?  A pic of an A4, but there isn't actually a TDI A4 available, only the uber expensive uber huge Q7/Touareg has a TDI.  Not even the Q5 has a TDI option, same with the VW Tiguan.  I LOVE the Q5 and Tiguan, but no TDI pisses me off.

Want a VAG TDI?  Jetta or HUGE SUV.  That's not how you get diesels out into the world.  Whereas VW UK sells my dream car.  A Passat Wagon with a 2.0TDI and a 6-speed.  Hell, you can get that same car in a DSG!

I also love how Audi touts the "fuel economy" of their A4 TSI and TFSI cars. My B5 S4 gets the same mileage, while making 305hp and going much much faster.

[OM617]

"Energy independence" is not possible. The US uses twice the oil of the next highest consumer and more oil per day than the next 5 highest consumers combined, including China!

Bio is not a viable replacement either. Look how the ethanol mandates (E10) have decimated corn prices and supplies. Nobody wants to be a farmer anymore either. It would take an entire state covered in Farms to make the equivalent of 20million barrels of oil per day to supply us greedy Americans. Then there is the issue of fertilizer needed to feed that much plant growth contaminating water supplies AND the issue of how to make that much fertilizer "cleanly".

Its all a pipe dream. Until "cold fusion" is pioneered and/or solar cells make a 10-fold jump in density/efficiency, oil is all we have.

[burn_your_money]

Its all a pipe dream. Until "cold fusion" is pioneered and/or solar cells make a 10-fold jump in density/efficiency, oil is all we have.

That won't help anything. Reducing what we use is the only viable answer.

[airhead]

But thats not a viable answer. People are never going to take a step back as far as that. Its a case of supply and demand. Whats needed is a new way of supplying existing demand. Anyway, if there was a way of reducing demand, such as a massive public transport system roll-out, you can be sure that a project of that scale would have an enormous impact on the environment both directly and indirectly in itself. You cant get something for nothing, and change as big as what you propose would come at a huge cost.

[ezekiel]

To say it'll never happen and keep going a long in a wasteful way isn't the answer either.  It's a fight, and no one can stop fighting until we've won. 

There is no one single answer.  ALL ideas must be used to create the solution. Little by little.  It'll never be overnight, no.

Personally, I don't think there's enough education of the public on just how bad the oil dependence and global warming issues are.

Hell, most people still think that global warming is a lie.   

Solar, Wave, and Wind energy are all very important.  Ethanol doesn't work not because of its cost, but because of the "flex fuel" thing.  You've now created an engine, in a massive SUV no less (which I don't feel is a good match for ethanol to begin with) that is neither petrol efficient, nor ethanol efficient.  An engine needs to be designed for ethanol to make ethanol to work.  Small high-compression engine in a light to medium class passenger car would work.  but using a low-compression V8 built on a design from the 60s is why ethanol has failed.

There are technologies coming, like the various algae technologies (oil and alcohol) that will help IMMENSELY, if they can just get manufacturing down, but I feel that's another issue, I don't think these startups look at manufacturing efficiencies very thoroughly, so new technologies fail because they're not profitable, not because the idea doesn't work, but the manufacturing process failed.