BMW carried out a survey of 2,068 motorists in Great Britain and found that no matter what motorists claim to want, what they really want is a BMW. While 20% of respondents said they look at CO2 levels when they research new cars, 75% said they'd only buy a car if they saved money. Which really means they'd only buy a car that slurped less gas than the one in the driveway. Another notable tidbit in the "Driving Change" survey revealed that only 13-percent of people believed that other folks were really buying environmentally friendly cars because of reduced emissions. That means that those Britons know why you really bought that Prius...

I'M LOSING MY BET ON DIESELS

A few years back I made a bet with a former Director of Engineering at General Motors. I bet him five bucks that Americans would fall in love with modern diesel engines and would want them in their cars. Specifically, I predicted that diesel sales in passenger cars would reach 1 million units by 2012. He bet it wouldn't happen.

Last year I ran into him and he ruefully conceded he was probably going to lose the bet. But that was last year. Now I'm pretty sure I'm the one who's going to lose. What a difference a year makes!

Readers of London's Sunday Times kept telling the auto reporters that the official mileage numbers for the Prius were overstated by about 15 imperial mpg. Intrigued, the Times decided to test things out by running a Prius against a BMW 520d with regenerative braking from London to Geneva, a 460-mile trip. Then they added 100 miles of urban running to give the Prius a chance to recover ground on its proper turf.