Does Diesel Belong in Racing?

Diesel... Long the bane of the performance enthusiast. Jeremy Clarkson once called it the fuel of Satan.

For years the idea of diesel as a racing fuel was laughed at. Diesel was a fuel meant for big trucks, and tiny cars meant to be extremely fuel efficient.

Then, in 2006, something amazing happened...

Diesel power won the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

All of a sudden, everything we knew about diesel changed. No longer was it a horrific fuel for boring folk. It was suddenly the future of racing!

Or not.

Because despite the Audi R10's success, there are still a great many people who look down on diesel as an inferior form of power. Some have threatened to stop watching a series if a diesel vehicle ever made it into the show!

Why is there such hostility towards diesel? It's certainly proven its worth, and in an age where environmentally-friendly fuel-efficient cars are becoming more important than ever, its an existing method of achieving these goals: It's clean, efficient, and readily available.

A little more expensive, perhaps, but imagine how expensive 100% Cellulosic Ethanol(my preferred form of clean fuel) while the infrastructure is being set up for it - assuming Cellulosic Ethanol proves viable.

Lack of power? Audi's proven that to be a non-issue. Throw on some good turbos and it can provide plenty of power over the entire rev range.

It seems anti-diesel hostility seems to come mostly from fans of Formula One, the "pinnacle" of motor sport.

Shouldn't the pinnacle of motorsport be the PERFECT place for performance diesel? Diesel's only real flaw is that it takes a little work to balance its power and efficiency. Isn't that the perfect challenge for the best engineers in the world to take on? To advance understanding of how to work with diesel?

F1 hasn't had a serious innovation since traction control. Working with diesel could bring back the technological advancement that is supposed to be the entire point of Formula One.

What better way to advance clean fuels than to prove they're not underpowered? What better series to prove they're not underpowered?

Some people say there really isn't much point in advancing diesel. Now that the Honda FCX Clarity has proven that hydrogen fuel cells are possible, efficient, and most importantly SAFE, its quite clear that hydrogen fuel cells are almost there, just about ready to solve the bulk of the emissions problems.

But wait... Despite being the most abundant element in the universe, hydrogen isn't THAT easy to get hold of. To produce it from water takes an enormous amount of energy.... To produce enough hydrogen to power all the cars in the world may be a difficult to impossible task.

Just as questions linger about whether Cellulosic Ethanol's production requirements can be offset by the amount of fuel produced, hydrogen has a big question mark that can kill it off easily.

But diesel's production costs are already well-known. We KNOW that its possible to produce enough diesel, both petroleum and bio-diesel, to power the world's cars. Its only issue is a lack of advancement to sell it to the performance-minded.

So I ask again... WHY should we NOT be using diesel in racing? WHY should F1 NEVER touch diesel? Racing has always been able to justify itself by purporting to help advance automotive technologies. Be they maintenance techniques, aerodynamic developments... Even NASCAR helps advance knowledge in regards to crash safety!

Saying F1, or ANY series, should never touch diesel completely goes against one of the most important aspects of automobile racing.

I say bring on the diesel. Lets prove that auto racing can bring us something not only important, but obvious enough that even the harshest critics can't say that auto racing never helps us.

Even so.... I'd rather have Ethanol.

A quick postscript for the environmentally-minded to think about: I don't believe human beings are causing Global Warming. List me something that proves Global Warming, and I can dig up a proven weather phenomenon that explains it being a natural occurrence.

Its for this reason that not too many people jump all over the "problem." Until Global Warming's cause has been proven beyond any possible doubt, you will NEVER get enough support for dealing with it by going on about it constantly. 

Use your heads: It just so happens that the same things that would fix Global Warming (assuming we're causing it) are the same things that would fix a whole host of long-since-PROVEN environmental problems. Focus on those, and you'll get a LOT more support.