For the past hundred years the petrol powered internal combustion engine has been the driving force in the world's automobiles.
Now a new challenger is fast edging petrol aside - the diesel engine looks like becoming the force of the future !
Diesel is not new. It has been around as long as the petrol engine, but apart from it's predominance in heavy trucks few motorists favoured it in cars.
It was noisy - smelly - and women in particular disliked the protocol of firing up " glo-plugs " to bring it to life.
The biggest advantage of diesel engines was the long operating life. The average diesel engine would outlast two or three petrol engines, but when it finally needed repair it was cheaper to discard and buy a new one.
The diesel engines now appearing in cars are a vast improvement on the past. Sit next to a diesel powered car at the lights and you would not notice a difference to a petrol engine. No noxious clouds of fumes. No rattling sounds as it idles.
Power now compares with petrol engines - and for most people they would be unaware of what engine is powering their auto.
The biggest difference between diesel and petrol is the range of products that can power the former. The beauty of a diesel engine is that it can run safely on almost unprocessed crude - despite the oil companies presently pricing it at a premium over petrol - and it runs happily on any of the vegetable based oils which we can grow locally. It can even run on the cooking oil used by the local fish and chip shop.
As the percentage of diesel powered cars increases, so will our dependence on middle east oil decrease.
Diesel will find itself competing with the hybrid breeds emerging, but it is probable that it will eventually be the fuel engine mix in the hybrid equation.
The hydrogen cell may not be too far away, but in the shorter term the diesel engine looks like becoming king.
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