Dear Diesel Owners,
It is certainly good news that Euro 5 Diesel has arrived on our shores after the agony of a long nail biting wait. Our neighbour across the causeway in Singapore are lucky to have B Zero Euro 5 Diesel by Caltex. We on the other hand considered lucky to even have Euro 5 recently even though it's of B7 quality.
For those of you whom are new to this B10 or B7 issue, let me clear the air for you. B10 indicates that the diesel consist of 10% oil palm and 90% diesel. Our current Diesel BMW can only tolerate up max B7 which means 7% oil palm and 93% diesel. It's written on our fuel caps. Go check if you need proof.
Because oil palm price is low and Malaysia has a surplus of it, the think tanks in the government plans to implement B10 into the diesel. BMW, Mercedes, Ford, Mitsubishi and even Toyota has voiced out that their cars cannot use B10. It will cause complications on the engines. However, government plans to carry on with this B10 plan is still unknown.
Let's look at the consequences if B10 is implemented into our diesels. Yes! This will also be implemented in your favourite blue pumps that pumps out Euro 5 diesels. For us BMW users, the likely consequences are:
1. We will be spending more money on maintenance as we probably have to change the engine oil after every 5000 km.
2. The lifespan of the engine will be severely affected.
3. It will be difficult to sell off your Diesel units and if you did manage to sell it off, I'll bet you are not going to get a good value out of it.
4. People are generally going to categorise buying a Diesel with no other option than B10 is basically committing vehicular suicide!
So what can existing Diesel BMW owners do? We can't take the risk of holding a protest infront of BMW Malaysia similar to what the Volkswagen Owners did to Volkswagen Malaysia. It'll basically be shooting ourselves in the foot as that will make the secondhand value of Diesel BMW plummet to the ground like a skydiver rushing to the ground without a parachute. Yes! We can learn from the VW mistakes.
Let's discuss here creatively and objectively on what will be the right way to handle this situation. It's midnight and I can only think of the following questions:
1. How can we convince the government to provide us diesel users the existing Euro 5 B7 diesel instead of standardizing B10 on all the pumps?
2. With just BMW users making noise, it's not really going to have an impact. It needs to be collective. It's needs to be voiced out together with other diesel users from different makes. How do we get all diesel users under 1 roof to make a collective effort to voice out our concerns?
3. What do you think BMW Malaysia and the other car companies roles should be in this situation ?
4. Can we voice out to consumer affairs department that we the diesel consumers are not being treated fairly if B10 is implemented? I really wonder if the consumer affairs department can help us in this situation ?
5. If government decides to bull doze through with B10 implementation, how should we be compensated by the government?
Ladies and gentlemen, the clock is ticking. It has been said that October 2015 is the planned roll out for B10. We should already have a plan in place. Better late than never eh? Our government is infamous in flip flopping the rules and regulations. For me personally, I hope they do a flip flop on this and forget about its implementation.
SAY NO TO B10 ! BE TREATED FAIRLY & DEMAND FOR YOUR RIGHTS !
Another day another SAY NO TO B10 DAY
Yours Faithfully.