GM to induct small capacity ECOTEC petrol engines in its cars by 2015

General Motors is apparently considering to introduce fuel efficient, small capacity ECOTEC petrol engine series in its car models across the world by 2015. With the increasing petrol prices in India, consumers are opting for diesel-driven cars due to its relatively lower price. However, the diesel prices are more or less equal to the petrol price or probably more than the petrol price in the developed countries, like U.K for example. The diesel is offered at a lower price in India, due to the initiative taken by the Indian government to offer diesel at a lower price for its high demand in the agricultural field. Diesel is heavily subsidized in India.

Higher costs are involved in manufacturing a diesel unit. Hence, once the government decides to remove the subsidies on the diesel price, running a diesel car and the petrol car will almost cost same to a consumer. The fuel efficient diesel will compensate for the higher cost of the diesel engine technology, which will put the diesel car and the petrol car on the equal ground. In this scenario, if General Motors succeeds in offering a petrol engine with boosted fuel efficiency, the petrol cars might regains its lost charm.

General Motors is currently developing its ECOTEC petrol engines through the combination of turbocharging and Direct injection technologies. They are aiming to manufacture a line of petrol engines, which could turn out to be more fuel efficient with low on emissions in comparison to the present petrol motors.

A turbocharged engine generates higher power and torque output and lowers the fuel emissions at the same time. This is the technology, where the exhaustible gasses are in turn used to spool up the turbocharger there-by reducing the fuel emissions. Once the overall driveability of engine is improved, the reduced number of gear changes will automatically boost the fuel economy.

The Direct Injection technology is where, the fuel is pumped into the combustion chamber at a high pressure, where the fuel is efficiently burnt out. This will enable the engine to consume lesser fuel resulting in lower emissions as lower the input, lower is the output.

On top of that, General Motors is also adding a dual fuel combination engines, like the petrol-LPG and petrol-CNG options for added fuel efficiency over the diesel engines. However, with all these technologies being incorporated in the small capacity ECOTEC engines, the costs are most likely to go up than the present petrol engines. General Motors has already introduced the larger capacity ECOTEC engines in their commercial vehicle line-up.

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