New BMW 3 Series named What Car? Green Car of the Year 2012

The new BMW 320d EfficientDynamics Saloon was named Best Executive Car of the Year at the What Car? Green Awards 2012. It won Green Car of the Year due to its unconventional statistics, combining outstanding fuel efficiency and emissions with impressive performance. With a combined fuel consumption of 68.9mpg and CO2 emissions of 109g/km, the 320d EfficientDynamics Saloon is still capable of traveling from zero to 62mph in 8.0 seconds.

Chas Hallett, What Car? editor in chief, said: “BMW’s engineers have worked very hard on their conventional engines and have given them some very unconventional green vital statistics. The choice of the 320d EfficientDynamics automatic Saloon as What Car?’s Green Car of the Year was a unanimous one. The 320d lets consumers who want to do their bit for the planet do so without compromise.”

Here is an excerpt from What Car? :

If anyone had told you as little as five years ago that you could buy a BMW 3 Series that would hit 60mph in less than eight seconds, average the best part of 60mpg (in the real world) and emit less than 110g/km of CO2, you’d have been carted off to the funny farm.

Yet, here we are, looking at a model that does all that – and more. The beauty of the 320d Efficient Dynamics is that it lets you go green without compromises. You can specify the automatic gearbox that makes the car more pleasant to drive, but even with it, the CO2 emissions are still 109g/km.

The car also contains everything that has already made the 3 Series an award-winner in its own right. Well, admittedly you need to specify the £750 M Sport adaptive suspension, but that’s a small price to pay for the class-leading balance of ride and handling.

Beyond that, the 3 Series is also tremendously easy to live with, with a high-quality interior, fine ergonomics thanks to the brilliant iDrive system, and plenty of room in the rear seats and boot. To cap it all, if you’re running this as a company car, no other 3 Series incurs less company car tax.

There’s so much more to the 320d Efficient Dynamics than low emissions and high economy. It isn’t just a great green car, it’s a great car – and a deserved winner of this award.

Read full article on What Car?