A LOOK AT THE LATEST MUST-HAVE CARS ON THE MARKET AS SEPTEMBER’S NEW REGISTRATION APPROACHES
IF you believe some of the stories you read we’ll all be driving pure electric cars before you can say ‘diesel’s dirty and petrol pollutes.’
Well, panic not if it’s a diesel you fancy when number plates change to ‘67’ in September, there are lots to choose from and some are hitting our roads for the first time.
Same goes for petrol power. With the latest pollution-fighting kit on board either fuel can be made clean enough for the most fastidious rule makers and both have years of life left in them.
That’s not to say electrical power won’t rule the roost one day, just that it’s some time off.
Even Volvo - which hit the headlines recently with a pledge to produce only cars with full or partial electric power by 2019 - has just announced a new model driven mostly by diesels, leaving part-battery and petrol to its dearest version.
The XC60 is priced from £37,205 and joins the range as a smaller sibling for the XC90. Most versions will use a 190 horsepower 2.0-litre diesel engine with a modest 133g/km of CO2 from the tailpipe.
And then there’s the current European Car of the Year, the Peugeot 3008 which is available with both diesel and petrol engines taking CO2 emissions for a full-sized SUV down to as low as 103g/ km - and that equates to a shade over 70mpg.
Prices for the large Peugeot start from £21,955 for the petrol version and £22,985 for the diesel.
Lacking any form of battery assist is the Range Rover Velar, designed to fill the gap between the top selling Evoque and high performance Range Rover Sport. It is priced from £44,830.
It is the most aerodynamic Land Rover yet and the low drag combined with lightweight aluminium construction give the entry level 2.0-litre Velar diesel an official fuel return of 52.5mpg.
Likely biggest seller of all the new cars is the latest Fiesta - Ford’s small hatch has topped the UK sales charts for the last eight years, after all. The new one stretches at the moment from 70 horsepower petrol £12,715 Style to 120 horsepower diesel £21,225 Vignale.
The exterior has grown very modestly but the biggest change by far is a new and more up to date interior. Most new Fiestas will use versions of the established 1.0-litre three-cylinder unit in differing outputs.
Rather faster than the Fiesta is Kia’s first high performance GT model – the Stinger – with a top speed of 167mph. It will be the fastest car so far produced by the Korean brand when it appears before the year’s end. Kia is targeting a 0 to 60mph performance of 5.1 seconds.
With Renault blazing a trail on the SUV scene, the new and larger Koleos (see Page 3) is of similar proportions to the likes of the Audi Q5 and Land Rover Discovery. Priced from £27,500, the six model range topping out at £34,200. Just two engines are available – 1.6 or 2.0-litre diesels.
Built on a new platform, the latest SEAT Ibiza (from £13,130) has improved back seat legroom and the boot has also been enlarged to 355 litres, making it best in the supermini class.
There is a choice of three petrol 1.0-litre engines