Green Driving

Wind rushing through your hair.  The warmth of sunshine on your skin.  There are fewer more liberating automotive experiences than a beautiful spring day with the top down on a convertible.  An open-air drive is further enhanced when your ride is not fouling the air or guzzling down gas. Here are the five convertible cars that deliver the most miles (and smiles) per gallon. Volkswagen Beetle DieselStarts at $23,495The clean diesel version of the Vo...

Australian efficiency enthusiasts John and Helen Taylor have been setting fuel economy records for the past three decades. This week, they set another by traveling 1,626 miles on a single tank of fuel, using a diesel-powered 2012 Volkswagen Passat TDI. The husband-wife driving team departed from Houston, Tex., driving for to Sterling, Virg. over the course of three days, taking turns behind the wheel. The journey required merely 19.3 gallons of diesel fuel to complete,...

In 1900, Rudolf Diesel ran his early experimental engine on pure peanut oil.  With minor modification, many of today’s diesel cars will readily run on 100 percent unmodified waste vegetable oil (WVO)—including used grease from fast-food fryers. The biggest challenge is keeping the oil warm and thus less viscous, because (as anyone who has seen congealed salad dressing knows) it turns into a jelly-like substance when cooled. Gary Zemola, who co-owns the Supe...

In 2009, Volkswagen introduced the first so-called “clean diesel” vehicle in the United States: the VW Jetta TDI (available as sedan or wagon).  The Jetta TDI demonstrated how a diesel’s turbocharging and direct injection technology translated to an impressive fuel economy rating of 41 mpg on the highway and 30 mpg in the city.  Except for hybrids, the Jetta TDI blew away all other pure petro-powered sedans in its MPG rating, drawing rave reviews from c...