Best Eco-Mobile With Muscle: Mercedes ML 320 BlueTEC
As my luxe Mercedes M-Class flies down a Carolina highway, the numbers go higher and higher. A record is at hand, and I wordlesslycommend my steely poise behind the wheel. No, I’m not talking speed. The Benz has reached 26 miles per gallon—class-kicking mileage for a luxury SUV—and there’s not a whirring electric motor to be heard, nor a hybrid battery weighing down the fun. This here’s a diesel, in all its fuel-saving, stump-pulling glory. Fine, so maybe driving for mileage doesn’t deliver the triple-digit ego boost of thrashing around in a sports car, but it’s sure as hell easier on the conscience. Idling at a stoplight, I hear the lightest ticking from the Mercedes’ 3.0-liter turbodiesel, nothing like the chug-chug of an old-school oil burner. There’s no exhaust soot, no smell.
With the engine emitting 20 percent less CO2 than gas models, a diesel wave is following Mercedes’ wake from the likes of VW, BMW, Audi, Nissan, Subaru, and Honda. As the miles spool out in plush style, I’m on pace to top a mind-blowing 600 miles on one tank. Four bucks a gallon or not, many Americans aren’t about to force their plus-size lifestyles into tiny econoboxes. The BlueTEC Benz is green icing on the SUV cake: Imagine a smug Prius going crunch under your wheels. If that doesn’t make you smile, you’re not alive.
