Volvo has made a formal commitment to lowering the fuel consumption on every vehicle in its range. How is it going to do it? By eliminating any engine that has more than four cylinders.
It sounds very simple, the Swedish automaker will drop out any five- and six-cylinder engines from its range over the next 10 years. Overall fuel economy figures and C02 emissions will drop and Volvo will earn a reputation as an environmentally conscious car maker. The key to this new initiative comes with the introduction of new three- and four-cylinder powerplants in both gasoline and diesel form.
The new engine family is called Volvo Environmental Architecture (VEA), and the new powertrains will be around 90kg lighter than Volvo’s current engines. In addition to the weight savings, the new engines will improve fuel economy by 35 percent. That’s a serious advancement and Volvo is saying that this is possible without a reduction in performance.
The all new 1.5-litre three-cylinder and 2.0-litre four-cylinder engines will begin finding homes in Volvo’s production models by 2013. By the time 2020 comes around, the entire Volvo lineup will be using them.