Cool.  Add a turbo and bump up the power.  Say hello to the 2010 WRX.

Very cool.

I was anti-diesel due to some bad experiences 20 years ago. That ended when
I rented an Audi A3 2.0T in Italy in October. Fun car, plenty of power and
great on fuel.

Jon

The article reads like a press release. But I am sure this car will
be reviewed in lots of magazines.

Oops, I just noticed that this is the Legacy, not the Impreza. Anyway,
it sill is good news, since now Subaru will start selling some cars
in markets like France, Portugal, etc. where gasoline engines are
almost impossible to sell (for some models 90+% of the cars sold
have a diesel engine).

Even in the UK, where the high price of diesel fuel means the maket
is less "dieseled" than others:

"Indeed, the firm's UK operation reckons it could have sold another 4,000
cars last year with a diesel in the line up. And when full production
comes on stream next year it expects 85% of Legacy sales to be oil
burners."
http://cars.uk.msn.com/Reviews/article.aspx?cp-documentid=7283675

Also, with the rules about average CO2 emissions (equivalent to fuel
consumption) the number of diesel cars sold allows them to sell some
more WRXs and STIs.

About the engine, the 150 HP are not particulary impressive. Yes, the
VW TDI has only 140 HP, but:

- VW has a tradition of underevaluating the power, while Japanese
  brands are usually slightly optimistic;

- the 140 HP version is only the first power level. There is a 170 HP
  version and I think there was at some point a 200 HP announcement
  (did that engine ever appear ?)

- and BMW has a 204 HP engine.

- the Mitsubishi concept presented at Detroit had a 201 HP engine
  (2.2 diesel). I don't know if the production version of that
  engine will have the same power, although technically it should
  be possible.

So, I hope that Subaru will make an higher power version in the near future.
But since they have an alloy block, they might not be able to compete with
the TDI, etc.

[ I like alloy blocks (less weight, better cooling), but usually the
maximum boost (and so the power) that they can endure is less than iron
blocks. For instance the Mitsubishi engineers said about the new Evo X
that the new engine (alloy block) could not be pushed above 360 HP.
The Evo IX (iron block) had a 400 HP version (FQ-400, UK market).
Also the new Nissan GT-R is supposed to be less tunable than the old
skyline (iron block) which some tuners pushed to 700+ HP. ]

OTOH, the engine has 150 HP at only 3600 rpm. So, if instead of increasing
the boost, Subaru increases the rpms to 4000-4200 it should be possible
to get to 170-175 Hp without much trouble.