Fuel for thougt

摘要

Streams of electrons can deliver the power required to move vehicles, but until batteries or fuel cells become affordable most will rely on streams of hydrocarbons injected at high pressure into the air trapped in combustion engines' ever smaller cylinders. Hybrids and electric vehicles are helping OEMs to reduce fleet-average CO_2 emissions but not quickly enough for next year's 130g/km target or even 2020's 95g/km. Only better combustion engines can do this. Much of the reduction in CO_2 will come from diesel, but the problem of relatively high NOx emissions will have to be addressed for Euro 6. This will add cost but the technologies also improve fuel consumption.