Diesel & petrol alternatives? Your thoughts please

I have been reading about the "silence" of EVs and from next year they must make a "sound" when travelling to warn pedestrians especially those with poor eyesight,well the new Jag has a sound to warn people if you look on the website

Admittedly I have not read all the posts on this thread however I have been to Beijing on business trips where hybrids and all electrics are common place in use from scooters, delivery carts upto top end motor cars to create the clean city image.  Now this sounds ideal however they all need a source of electricity which means mass expansion of power stations and in this case fossil fuel which contributes to chronic and often deadly air pollution levels. 

I have been towing for many years.  My last three cars were diesel, and last July I changed to yet another diesel - this one has a Euro 6 engine.   It has a catalytic converter, a DPF and an Ad Blue tank.

The catalytic converter turns 3 harmful gases into harmless ones:  carbon monoxide into carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxides into nitrogen and oxygen, and hydrocarbons into carbon dioxide and water.

The DPF collects particle solids and burns them off into less harmful ash.

The Ad Blue is metered into the exhaust system to break down the mono-nitrogen oxides into harmless nitrogen and oxygen.

Diesel engines also produce less CO2 than petrol engines, so are less threatening to global warming.

Environmentalists seem not to appreciate these improvements, neither does the government take any trouble to set the record straight.   What happened to the early concerns about the removal of lead from petrol and it being replaced by benzene?   Benzene is a known substance for having cancer causing properties.  That fact seems to have faded into history, but how relevant is it?

So is the "dirty diesel" accusation simply a myth that is pushing owners away from the benefits of a frugal diesel engine and into the realms of more gas-guzzling petrol alternatives?

Look at the news today and all the problems are of people meddling in things ,and blame every thing on diesel ,s. Look at this cost to jaguar Landrover,and to the ordinary person trying to run a car I think in a few years caravan ing and motor home use will get out of the reach of the ordinary people who love this hobby or way of life.

But the problem is the makers cheated.  They underdosed the Adblue so it has a limited effect.  I have seen reports that there are trucks that produce less NOx than cars.  So great in theory in the real world maybe not  

https://driving.ca/auto-news/news/explainer-how-cars-can-cheat-with-their-diesel-adblue-additives

https://www.fleetnews.co.uk/news/fleet-industry-news/2017/01/09/nox-emissions-from-euro-6-diesel-cars-more-than-double-modern-diesel-trucks-according-to-new-study

The 'cheating' by the makers to get better emission figures is old news and things have moved on.  AD Blue, correctly metered, does work.  In the past, there were dirty engines, diesel and petrol, emitting vast amounts of poisonous gases and we were all familiar with the blue smoke from exhausts.

The pressure on manufacturers was a good thing and the result of technology to directly improve the situation has brought great improvements.  The real problem is that the environmental 'purists' want action beyond the bounds of practicality and economic common sense, and some areas of government are frightened of ballot box repercussions so that the issue is becoming political rather than a balanced approach and reliance on ongoing technical advances.

For guidance, just look at the French Crit'Air ratings.  After hydrogen and electric powered vehicles at the top end, there are five categories (1 t0 5) for vehicles with 1 being the best.   Euro5 and Euro6 petrol engines are in cat.1, and Euro5 and Euro6 Diesel engines are in cat.2.  If you consider the vast number of older vehicles which will eventually be scrapped and replaced by new and/or used vehicles with Euro5 and Euro6 engines, plus the almost certain further improvements in the Internal Combustion Engine, things aren't looking so bad for either petrol or diesel.   Additionally, sensible approach to this will provide time for the necessary infrastructure to be put in place to accommodate an en masse of electric vehicles on our roads, and also a less damaging effect on the economy by plants and people becoming rapidly redundant in the petroleum industries.  A sudden clamour now for electric vehicles, and if that demand was successfully met by manufacturers, would very likely bring chaos by electric vehicles running out of power with insufficient charging points or locations to install them.

For the leisure industry - those who tow caravans, boats and horse boxes - has anyone yet considered the possible effects by the eventual demise of diesel and petrol engined powered vehicles? 

Your first paragraph has some mis information.  Blue(ish) smoke from a vehicles exhaust system is a result of the engine burning oil which is contaminating the combustion process. 3 main causes being worn piston rings or bores, valve guides or valve stem seals or a worn turbo. Blue = worn engine or other fault. 

Incorrect combustion /poor combustion will create Black or Grey smoke  depending on what the root cause is.  White-ish is basically just steam from any moisture present.  

Perhaps a return to horse power should be considered. Twin axial caravans would probably require two, and fart collection bags would assist with cooking fuel. 

Since the rush to divest diesel and purchase smaller petrol driven cars CO2 levels have risen by 3%

The 'cheating' by the makers to get better emission figures is old news and things have moved on. AD Blue, correctly metered, does work. 

So you are saying that all the vechicles on road now, that previously had declared emissions that bore no relationship to the actual real world  emission levels are all now fixed?   AdBlue all that is now dosed in sufficient volumes to produce the claimed values?  Just because it’s old news doesn’t make it untrue.