Diesel seen overtaking petrol as top motor fuel
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By Sujata Rao
MONACO, June 7 (Reuters) - Technological advances and a significant price advantage could propel diesel ahead of gasoline as the favoured motor fuel of the 21st century, forcing oil refiners to change production strategies, industry experts said on Friday.
While gasoline continues to dominate the light transport industry in most developed countries, diesel is fast catching up as more vehicle manufacturers develop diesel powered light cars.
"Diesel is coming to be seen as sexy these days," Stewart Pedder, automobile analyst at the DRI-WEF consultancy told Reuters at the sidelines of an energy refining conference in Monaco. "It's fast losing its old image of a sluggish, dirty and slow fuel suitable only for trucks."
Its growing acceptance is reflected in car sales which have seen diesel powered light vehicles account for 40 percent of all sales in first quarter of this year in Western Europe, up from 36 percent last year and less than 10 percent in early 1990s.
Pedder said the shift was spearheaded by Europe's automobile industry, banking on buyers' cost-consciousness just as diesel fuel was coming to be seen as environmentally acceptable.
European Union legislation has forced refiners to produce eco-friendly, lower sulphur diesels........
