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What is it?

Like the impressive Focus Econetic below it, the new Ford Mondeo Econetic is the most frugal and lowest carbon-emitting Mondeo you can buy.

Effectively, it’s a 1.8-litre TDCi Zetec model with Michelin Primacy low rolling resistance tyres, a marginally more aerodynamic body, some lower-friction gearbox oil and a slightly more parsimonious engine management system for its 123bhp diesel four-pot.

There are no expensive lithium ion batteries or fancy exhaust...Read the full article

With these kind of simple-but-effective CO2 saving changes, why don't manufacturers just adopt them across their model range en masse rather than shuffling them off into green subbrands like Econetic or Blumotion or whatever? Economies of scale would surely largely offset any additional cost - for example, the £250 premium that the Mondeo Econetic commands could be easily absorbed or a modest price rise made.

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Impressed that it is pretty much like a standard Mundaneo to drive and only £250 more to purchase.  Ford have obviously worked hard.  However, possibly not hard enough.  If it shed some weight as well and how much lower could the CO2 be?

Starting to make the likes of the Prius look exactly what they are - a con!

Ford should make the tweaks standard across the range and make every diesel Mondeo reasonably 'green'. Renault's smallest Laguna Diesel engine emits just 130 g/km, and that isn't even a special model. Ford seem to be weight-saving in the New Fiesta, why not do a bit more in the Mondeo? But they have worked quite hard, I agree. Just a little bit more would be nice.

139g/km puts the car in band C, so worse than a bog standard, un-'Econetic' 520d.

Slow news day?

Both this and the BMW 520d are in Band C for VED car tax this year, so you'll pay £120 tax on both. For next year, they're both in band E, and you'll pay £115 for both. They're both in the 15 per cent company car tax band for 2008/9, so you'll pay the same proportion of their list price as tax that way - and that, of course, means the Ford will be considerably cheaper to tax, because it costs less. But aside from all that, I'd say a new low-carbon version of one of the biggest selling new cars in the country was a pretty newsworthy thing to review, wouldn't you?