Environment
Volvo are as committed to a cleaner and healthier environment as they are committed to delivering safer cars. The company has been using water-based paint for their car exterior, diesel particulate filters for their oil-burning engines and advanced emission control systems for every powertrain. The adoption of front-wheel drive with optional all-wheel drive has been offered far before it became a visible norm of late. In this age of downsizing, Volvo have been rather bold to state that all new engines will be four-cylinder units.
In case you haven’t been in on things, the 4.4-litre Yamaha-built V8 has been off the list since 2010. The 3.2-litre straight-six got the axe soon thereafter and it’s only the T6 turbocharged 3.0-litre straight-six petrol and 2.4-litre five-cylinder turbo-diesel that are still offered. The former has already been discontinued and the D5 too is on its way out.
Volvo have already introduced their new Drive-E line of engines — four-cylinder engines displacing 1,969 cc in both petrol and diesel guises — which use direct injection and a combination of turbochargers and superchargers in a number of configurations to deliver between 181 PS in the basic turbo-diesel and 450 PS in the supercharged twin-turbo petrol. Moreover, electrification plays a huge role in achieving better output figures over a wider range with much greater efficiency. The combination of the internal combustion engine and the electric motor is set to make its way into several models. In fact, the new cars are all being built keeping electrification in mind, so much so that customers will soon be able to specify hybrid-electric powertrains as easily as specifying a paint and interior scheme for their vehicle configuration.
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