Early in 2007 Ford will begin selling diesel versions of its F-250 and F-350 pick up trucks that will use the new cleaner diesel fuel,according to the Detroit News http://www.detroitnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060822/AUTO01/608220361/1148. Ford also announced a larger diesel engine for its Super Duty line. The optional 6.4-liter Power Stroke diesel engine but will have be more fuel efficient than its predecessor.

Auto manufacturers have been retooling their vehicles to use the cleaner burning low-sulfur diesel. BMW, Jeep, and VW have announced new models with engines optimized to reduce pollution. Now that diesel vehicles have cleaned up their act, it's expected that a flurry of new diesels will arrive in the next few years, perhaps many of them based on European models.

We'd be saving lots of oil if we did like the Europeans and drove as many of the more fuel efficient diesels as gasoline vehicles. I'd also like to see some diesel SUVs that could get closer to 30 mpg.

California received the first shipments of the new low-sulfur diesel fuel (97 percent less sulfur) that the EPA required to begin replacing the existing fuel supply this fall.

And in other diesel vehicle news, the land speed record for a diesel was recently set at the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah. The JCB Dieselmax hit 328.767 miles per hour. Now that's fast.

When Vista is finally ready to ship, it will arrive bundled with a FREE copy of Duke Nukem Forever.