My daily driver now is a 2004 Dodge 3500 4x4 LB Quad cab diesel. 14 mpg around town. I don't view diesel as a hassle. If anything, there's less maintenance. But that maintenance tends to cost more. I've moved our company truck fleet to almost all diesel. Resale on those trucks is much higher with diesel. BTW, I did a search. Those used Jetta diesels are holding their value well. For example, a 2006 with less than 50,000 miles on it, very nicely equipped but with a manual tranny, is advertised just below $22,000. I'm hoping a new one with an automatic, not so nicely equipped, won't be much more than that.
The only extra work on my diesel today is to change the fuel filter more often than on a gasser. And I do wait a few seconds for the pre-heat cycle before starting the engine. In winter, that might be up to 30 seconds. No biggie.
Now that diesel actually costs more than gas, yes, it does put a crimp in things. I'm running a spreadsheet, trying to come up with reasonable lifetime cost estimates. At first blush, very preliminary figures indicate that if the diesel gets about one third better mileage than the gasser, the diesel will be comfortably ahead in fuel cost savings. This assumes that any difference paid for the diesel engine to start with is recovered upon resale. For our fleet trucks, the diesel difference is actually greater at resale than what we paid for originally. This holds for level fuel costs and 5% inflation. As the inflation rate goes up, the diesel advantage becomes much greater, especially over 4-5 years. I checked my records. The average annual rate of increase for diesel that I've bought since 2004 is 31.3%. Of course, if that held up the diesel advantage would be greater still, but at some point the price of the vehicle becomes moot because the annual cost of fuel becomes much larger than the car payments. I doubt that fuel will increase more than 5% - 10% annually, averaged over the next few years. And I suspect that early reports are true, regarding real world diesel Jetta driving yielding 20% better mpg than the EPA figures.
Diesel should in fact cost less than gasoline, because it is simpler to refine. Increase in demand (including the very similar home heating oil) is jacking up the cost. And "because they can." Diesel inherently is about 30% more efficient than gas engines. About half of that is due to the higher BTU number for diesel, and half due to basic engine efficiency (compression vs spark ignition, higher compression ratios, no oxygen starvation etc).
About 40% of fueling stations nationwide serve diesel, and that number is growing slowly. I have no trouble finding diesel wherever I travel. However, most places do have only the one dispenser with two nozzles, one for each side of the fueling island. And yes, since there are also gasoline dispensers there, I am limited in choice and do sometimes have to wait a bit longer.
I've considered making my own fuel, from used vegetable oil, but I already have enough hobbies to keep me busy. Besides, the county is murmuring about co-opting all the used veggie oil for their own use.
I do have concerns about reliability. I just can't get "Eurovan" out of my head. VW's history is mixed. And I don't view them as a technology leader. However, there are some VW diesel fans out there, just as there are for the old Mercedes diesels. At least, as a company vehicle, this is not much of a personal risk.
I'm rethinking the whole list, especially as the boss loosened up the requirements today. It just has to be highly fuel efficient, not necessarily the highest. And low total cost of ownership, not necessarily the very lowest.
That means taking another look at the Yaris, as well. Ugh. And maybe the Mini Cooper.
