Suggested Citation:
Fulton, Lewis (2013) Introduction to Energy Policy special issue "Decades of Diesel". Energy Policy 54, 1 - 2

Lew Fulton serves as guest editor for this special section dedicated to Lee Schipper. Since Schipper's passing, Fulton took over the role as editor of the special section. In his introduction, Fulton comments on the selected papers, which provide a wealth of data and analysis on the status and history of dieselization in Europe (with one paper, as well, on the U.S.). Diesels are interesting for at least three reasons:  a) they are clearly more efficient on a "side by side" comparison with gasoline vehicles but don't look much better in the aggregate, averaged across all purchases in any given year;  b) They became increasingly popular in Europe through the 1990s and up to the mid-2000s (e.g. 2005 or so) but since then their rise has slowed and even reversed in some countries. The reasons for this are not fully clear but include policy and, perhaps, saturation of the long-distance driving market. Regardless, the European experience is very different from that of the U.S., where diesels have failed to catch on except in the large pick-up truck segment of LDVs. And c) their CO₂ benefits are increasingly understood to depend not only on efficiency but also on their pollutant emissions – PM and black carbon – as these also may have an important effect on climate.  This volume explores all these questions.