Gasoline and diesel both have their good and bad sides. In processing, diesel is simpler to refine, yet it requires more crude oil to make a gallon of diesel than a gallon of petro gasoline. In cars, the engine of diesel vehicles is also more expensive than the gasoline engine to make. In addition, diesel has more energy per gallon than gasoline so can be better for some reasons. In terms of polluting the atmosphere, both diesel and gasoline produce different things that contribute to pollution. Gasoline vehicles put out a lot of green house gases, while diesel vehicles put of a lot of polluting debris. Europe encourages the use of diesel, so makes gasoline more expensive than diesel. In the United States, we encourage the use of gasoline so gasoline is less expensive than diesel. This is mainly because of how much low emitting diesel fuel costs to refine now.
I think this is important because it can help us decide what we can do while still using fossil fuels that will help our environment more. We can decide weather or not green house gases or particle emissions are worse for the environment, or even decide that in some parts of the world one is better than the other. Also diesel is important because the vehicles running on diesel can easily be run on bio diesel made of plants now or in the future with little trouble.
I reviewed the article called “Will Diesel Save the World,” at Slate.
