DIESEL VS. GASOLINE: WHICH IS BETTER?

**(Picture in Seattle, Washington, USA)

If you want a vehicle that is fuel-efficient, you should probably compare some diesel vehicles too. Nowadays, regular fuel prices have skyrocketed so much that they are either more expensive or similar in cost when compared to the price of diesel. 


What's diesel, you say? It's not very suprising that some of the population of the US don't even know what 'diesel' is. Anyways, it is another type of gas that some cars run on. Note the word some because in the USA, there aren't as many diesel vehicles as there are in Europe and other Asian countries. There are benefits and cons of having a diesel vehicle as well. 


By having a diesel vehicle, you get better fuel economy and performance. For example, compare an 2012 Audi A3 2.0T TFSI and an Audi A3 2.0 TDI. The car with the diesel engine is the TDI version, since it has an average MPG of 34, and 24 for the 2.0T. Also by having a diesel vehicle, you get a lot of torque. This means that you have a lot of acceleration off the line. Once again, compare those two vehicles and you will notice that the TDI (diesel) version has 29 lb/ft of torque more than the regular 2.0T. 


There are some drawbacks, however. If you compare the two engines again, you might notice that the diesel version has far less horsepower (TDI has 140hp, and 2.0T has 200hp). This means that in highway speeds, you might have some time passing a slow driver. The next drawback is what makes most buyers turn away right away, fuel pricing. Like mentioned before, diesels have similar pricing compared to the regular gasoline, but diesel is usually more expensive. How much? About .05 dollars to about 1 dollar. Another thing to worry about is pricing of the car in general, since diesels aren't usually very cheap. (The cheapest diesel on the market is the 2012 Volkswagen Jetta TDI)


In conclusion, diesel might be the better way to go if you like fuel economy/range, a lot of torque, and don't really care about anything else.