A1 gets the greenlight, but Audi chief says it's not for the U.S.
We love what Audi has done for the image of the modern diesel engine, and even though their state-side offering isn't the greenest stable on the block, they pulled a respectable 533 in J.D. Power and Associates' Automotive Environmental Index (AEI). That was good enough to place them 13th on the inaugural list just after the Mini. Speaking of the Mini, where would Audi have placed if they offered a small, economical A1?
Motor Trend is reporting that Audi is aiming to present six new vehicles for release in the next three years. Whether or not they'll hit their timetable is one matter up for discussion, but what we're particularly interested in is the fact that they included the A1 on their list. It was "a well-placed member of [Audi's] marketing department" who informed the magazine that Audi chief Martin Winterkorn is an admirer of BMW's Mini which the A1 would presumably target. There is, however, a fine line between admiration and jealously. Winterkorn insists that the car will not be a clone of the Mini as he calls the U.K. icon "an accident that came out of BMW's ill-fated British adventure." One other point that Winterkorn makes is that the Mini's American success was also an accident. He says, "U.S. sales aren't a priority for us... [Y]ou can't design a small car with U.S. success as the object."
This, of course, gets our green blood boiling, but does Winterkorn make a good point? Outside of our major metropolitan cities is there a market for small, economical cars? The Mini has obviously done well, but is that only because of the brand's iconic status? And how will the most diminutive of cars, the Smart ForTwo, sell in the states? Is Audi's premium-brand status a factor in Winterkorn's remark? Then again, the last time I checked, VW has yet to export the Polo to our shores. As always, sound off in the comments section. We're particularly interested to hear what you think about the American market for small, economical cars.
[Source: Motor Trend]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
George Krpan 5:11PM (10/21/2006)
Audi is so blowing it by not bringing the A1 to the USA.
I've often thought about the motivation of foreign auto makers for not bringing their premium small cars to the USA.
I think it's because they make more money on the bigger cars. They're putting their profits ahead of what's beneficial for the enviornment and the peak oil issue. In the long run they'll slit their own throats.
The poorly informed American car buyer has to share the blame. I'll bet most are unaware that these premium small cars exist. Also, the price of gas goes down for a few weeks and large SUV sales increase. Yikes! I'll bet few Americans equate the weight of a vehicle and it's engine size to fuel mileage.
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M. 7:35AM (10/23/2006)
Currently, the Euro and the Brasilian Real are to high to export our small cars to the US. Besides that the premium equipped small cars like Peugeot 207 or VW Polo easily hit the 22.000€ with some extras like A/C, leather and an adequate sound system. Minus the VAT, plus tariffs these cars would have to cost around 25.000$ to account for the same profits the car companies make on them in Germany or the UK.
Smaller does not necessarily mean cheaper.
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George Krpan 2:03PM (10/23/2006)
Cheaper is not the point. The point is that small cars get better gas mileage. If you have to drive a small car why not drive a premium small car? At some point the notion will enter the mainstream that driving a car any larger than you absolutely need is bad for your image. Those that currently drive large expensive gas guzzlers will be looking for small expensive fuel efficient cars. Heck, they don't really even have to be that fuel efficient, they just have to look like they are. Nothing portrays this better than the size of a car. To this sort of buyer image trumps all.
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Roger Pfeiffer 5:48PM (10/26/2006)
SAAB is another car company that markets diesel cars in Europe and is definitely one of the worlds' leading car makers in vehicle safety, as is Volvo. It is notable that both companies are located in relatively tiny Sweden, a country that cares deeply for the welfare and safety of people. SAAB and Volvo have a history of bringing out safety innovations not because they have to, but rather because they WANT to! Both companies go to accident scenes involving their cars to study how they can make their cars safer...how admirable!
Alternative fuels for an automobile are certainly becoming increasingly important as time goes on. Eventually, we are bound to run out of fossil fuel on this planet, as there is a finite amount to pump from underground. Additionally, the rate at which we use it up will be increasing, especially since China is just beginning its rapid expansion in the use of cars. Also, the way things have been going in recent years, the carbon dioxide released from burning fossil fuel, fuel that has been buried for millions of years underground, is causing “the greenhouse effect” to be of major concern because of the global warming it causes. Clearly, the polar ice caps are melting at an increasingly alarming rate, and not as much of the water is re-freezing in the “winter months” (depending on the pole). If we don’t do something about it soon, like within about 20 years, we will find our cities on the coasts buried under water. Also, as I understand it, the warming of the oceans will cause quite dramatic shifts in weather patterns, meaning more hurricanes and stormy weather. I’m not writing this for the purpose of extolling gloom and doom, but rather to point out that we human beings in the near future need to be altering our ways of burning such large amounts of fossil fuel. We need to ramp-up the development of new technology and methods to power our cars and to be less reliant on cars in general. Of course public transportation helps, but we need to develop the technology and efficiency of using alternative sources of energy soon. In my opinion, ethanol is an important component of the bridge needed to get us to the use of hydrogen cells, and beyond, to power our vehicles. The beauty of burning ethanol, being that it comes from the fermentation of vegetative sources such as corn, wood pulp, and many other plant sources, in effect recycles the carbon dioxide present in our atmosphere. Plants use it to grow in the process of photosynthesis. Brazil uses almost exclusively ethanol that is derived from sugarcane grown there.
Here in the U.S. and elsewhere, the auto makers are producing more and more cars that will run on “E85” fuel, composed of 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline. Gasohol (10% ethanol) has been a good start, but E85 is even better in my opinion. Vehicles that will run on either gasoline or E85 are called “flex-fuel vehicles” (FFVs). In the latest issue of the leading consumer magazine is a front-page article about what they deem, “the ethanol myth”. They came to the conclusion that it is disadvantageous to run a FFV vehicle on E85 fuel instead of gasoline. Both the fuel economy and acceleration of the 2007 SUV tested dropped when running on E85 compared with gasoline.
From this, it seems apparent to me that the U.S. needs to catch up to Sweden, General Motor's Saab in particular. Running on E85, the Saab 9-5 "BioPower" Turbo model delivers a significant 20 percent increase in maximum power and 16 percent more torque while emitting 80% less CO2 into the environment compared to running it on gasoline. Running E85 compared to gasoline takes about a second off the 0-60 mph time, and there is a 15 percent gain in fuel economy on the open road where fuel-enrichment for engine cooling is no longer necessary when a vehicle is run on ethanol. The 9-5 BioPower has taken the Swedish market by storm this year, outselling its full-year 2006 sales target in just four months. Sweden has a long cultural and political tradition of respect for the environment, and this is reflected in Saab's achievements of the pioneering of asbestos-free brake linings and the removal of CFCs from air conditioning systems, and now Saab’s Trionic 7 BioPower engines. I remember back in 1973, when the oil embargo hit and additional "smog control" devices (i.e., the EGR valve and air pump) were required on new cars, their performance declined significantly. Many people at the time, including mechanics and engineers, thought the performance and efficiency of cars had been dealt a lethal blow. This is when I bought my first Saab, a 99 EMS. Saab, with the development of the "lambda sond" oxygen sensor (keeps the correct stoichiometric ratio of 14.5 to 1 in the air-fuel mixture) in 1976 along with electronic fuel injection, required no such smog control devices. It was the beginning of electronics-to-the-rescue for car performance. This technology, along with concern for safety and functionality, enamored me with the cars. I was impressed that they did this because they wanted to, as opposed to doing it because they had to. Seemingly at odds with one another, performance and fuel economy were blended together in a practical and distinctive car.
So here we are, forty years later, and Saab is still leading the way in emissions and performance technology. All Saabs are turbocharged and have direct ignition, and the engine’s combustion process is very precisely controlled by a powerful 32-bit microprocessor controlled system called, "Trionic 7". This unit monitors the combustion process in each cylinder a million times per second for optimum efficiency. It precisely regulates the fuel-air mixture in each cylinder, the ignition timing, and the amount of turbo boost pressure allowed. And(!), very significantly, it automatically adjusts itself to any proportion of gasoline and ethanol.
How does Saab achieve higher performance using E85 compared to gasoline, you might ask? It stems from the octane rating of E85 being about 10% higher than that of gasoline. The Trionic system thus allows more advanced ignition timing, a higher compression ratio, and a higher turbo boost pressure, all of which increase the performance and efficiency of the engine.
There are two driving forces behind the adoption of a renewable and sustainable fuel such as “bioethanol” E85: The environmental need to combat climate change from the greenhouse effect and the strategic need to overcome dependency on oil, a finite resource for which global demand will exceed supply, not to mention the world tensions related to it’s procurement. Sweden plans on being free of dependency on oil by the year 2020. Let's hope that the same will be true of the U.S. It appears to me that General Motors, especially with Saab’s traditional engine know-how, is leading the way.
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Emanuel 8:31AM (11/10/2007)
I would really be interested in knowing the true cost of bringing these small premium vehicles to this country. Take Ford for instance, they make a word car "Focus" that was a world car for only one phase of the cars life. We have an ugly Focus now compared to the one Europe gets. How is it that the same companies who are headquartered in the U.S make such awesome cars in small vehicle classes that we never see. There are definitely some of us that would spend more $$$$ to get those premium niche vehicles. We are the same people that would spend premium bucks to get the big vehicles too rather than to get a Ford FiveHundred.. O I mean a Taurus!
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