YES, what have I been telling you for the last couple of years.

Davemart

VW has already started fitting particulate filters to their gasoline engine cars (2017).

https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/industry/volkswagen-group-fit-particulate-filters-all-petrol-engines-2017

Laszlo

Difficult to know who should be trusted?

People have a hard time as it is simply doing maintenance to their vehicle. Having them use a gasoline car that needs to be maintained like a diesel is asking for trouble.

Most of the particulate can be mitigated by tuning of GDI. The filters and the sensors to operate the DPF system successfully are not cheap. DPF on gasoline equipment will quickly lead to the demise of the ICE, an increase of the average age of the cars on the road, and general distain from the public.

Upfront it might add $3000-4000 to the cost of the car. Manufacturers might just cut the losses and go back to port injection.

There is no good, cheap way to put particulate filters on small cars. Big trucks are much easier to bury the costs on. Also you have to drive like a mad man to bring the filters up to light off temperatures on normal short drives, meaning most people who granny their cars will spend tons of money trying to keep their cars from de-rating on them.

People are confusing particulate filters with NOx control measures (SCR). Particulate filters don't require any additives. SCR is the one that requires the special fluid and dosing system.

It's currently thought that the higher exhaust temperature from a gasoline engine during cruising conditions will keep the particulate filter hot enough (unlike diesel applications), and the frequent short periods of coasting (which shuts off the fuel completely but need not shut off air supply) will provide sufficient oxygen for passive regeneration without needing any active method of regeneration, aside from perhaps holding the throttle open a bit during coasting to pump air through (this is a trivial matter for drive-by-wire, which everything has nowadays). If that proves to be the case, the filter is unlikely to require any maintenance until the engine gets old enough to start consuming lubricating oil ... then, look out.

unlikely to require any maintenance until the engine gets old enough to start consuming lubricating oil ... then, look out.
Exactly.
Wheather the O2 sensor, catalytic ageing poor maintenance of other components and lubricants (A big stink in E.U. over disabling of SCR AD blue on trucks as a money saving excersise) the results are the same.

All components are subject to failure for numerous reasons as any mechanic (technician) knows.

There are anecdotal accounts of imported second hand cars from (in this example Japan) that have reached the end of economical life in that country with relatively low KLM's where the evidence suggests that the engines oils have never been changed.
Owners making economic decisions, knowing the cars will be scrap value most often neglect appropriate maintenance.

New cars are not uniformally compliant to any standard simply because they are 'new'. The number of faults on new vehicles has been shown over decades to be high(er in the first year) than average yet they are often exempt from even basic licensing requirements for (here .au) 5 years.

How many districts have appropriate testing?
I can say for sure - NONE. Some districts do random sampling. Just because the technology exists does not mean it meets the objective..

Evidence globally is proof that until last year testing authorities did not even have equipment capable of higher resolution diagnosis.

I doubt given the volumes of and technical realities of I.C.E. engine cars that any can hope to meet their social obligation.

Even if the magic formula could be achieved, we still must face facts that there are almost no vehicles in today's fleet capable of resolving the matter. We are constantly asked to take assurances on 'faith'.

Engines will be with us for decades, to pretend everything will be EV real soon now is a fantasy.

@Trees
Ethanol/gasoline blends also generate particles. So does E85, particularly at cold starts at low ambient temperatures. This was shown almost a decade ago. Thus, these engines also need filters, just as GDIs running on gasoline.

Besides soot, engines also produce ash from the lube oil. This you get also with gaseous fuels, e.g. CNG and hydrogen (they also need lubrication). Lube oil ash has severe health effects and thus, a filter is needed in this case as well.

Not so, ethanol makes a tremendous improvement in PMs. Only when tested with bogus EPA test fuel designed by the petrol does ethanol look bad. The test fuel is not even close to average consumer fuel. The test fuel is designed to make ethanol fuel look bad upon test results with gasoline. Again, this info is within the public domain. Independent (non government) labs prove the accusation. The problem is the EPA doesn't care or aren't concerned. They are independent and beyond any evaluation. They do what they want and what they want is to gain political power and wealth.

Yes, ethanol zone of emissions is higher upon cold startup, but one must understand that ethanol fuel has zero engineering dedicated to minimize pollution as compared to gasoline or diesel fuel. If ever that would happen, ethanol has maximum ability to minimize pollution as a comparison. The chemistry of ethanol is simple and consistent. Since the fuel boasts of liquid oxygen half the problem is solved. Note that petrol additives for octane boost are unhealthy and bad for the environment let alone cost more as compared to ethanol. But what is petrol to do if ethanol takes over the high octane market? They will lose a lucrative refinery product in which they have no other high profit use for. They don't want to crack the fuel additive to plain gasoline for the sake of the environment. Much easier to utilize politics to force the transportation industry to engineer a lower polluting way to use the stuff. So what if consumers pay more. Consumers don't pick up the take for crony capitalism.

Some points-

1. Running E85 within an engine optimised for gasoline not the best condition to minimise E85 emission nor maximise the fuel's efficiency. At that, the emissions of E85 are a mixed bag, with cold start higher and normal operation and acceleration much less. However, the emissions in general are less toxic ie. no carcinogenic benzene. BTW their is much science dedicated to the task to minimize the environmental concerns of petrol and some of that is set up to diss ethanol. It's accurate science, just how they set it up will result in phony conclusions. UAI has taken much of this "science" to task with independant lab results. A lot of money out their for scientist to prove wanted results. Science is not as objective and of pure virtue as the public is led to believe. There is a cottage industry afoot for R&D paper generation to keep the gov't free money flowing. Same for petrol marketing purposes as well.

2. E85 vs diesel? That can't be a good comparison. A diesel engineered and tweaked to minimize pollution with pollution control equipment doing the same. As compared to what? We have no E85 engine. Cummings per CA EPA did engineer a E85 test vehicle in which a diesel engine was utilized within spark ignition conversion. They found the engine optimized for E85 fuel beat mpg of a comparative gasoline engine option and best the torque of diesel 2x. Yes, the E85 engine only needed half the displacement to equal diesel engine torque. The project review noted a turbo cooler could have bumped up the E85 efficiency and that E100 had much higher efficiency than what would be normally expect. Oh, Calf. air emissions were easily met with the normal (cheap) catalytic auto system as opposed to the very expensive diesel system. The E85 being half the size would also be half the weight of the normal heavy diesel and much cheaper.

3. Also, were not really suggesting E85 a good solution for replacing gasoline GDI fuel. What automotive wants is high octane. As you are a reader of GCC, you already know a commision is at work as we speak to prequalify fuels for the task. Apparently, they are leaving no stone unturned and believe a bimix or trimix of complementary fuels the solution to high efficiency and low emissions. Alcohols look to play a major role in curing the problem. Most know the petrol's high octane adjuncts very nasty and unhealthy.

I don't buy it. I'm not going to read the 9 yr old study. Diesel is the problem and in a far 2rd place is DI gasoline. No up to date analysis of the problem is claiming E85 the problem. U.S. cities are thinking in terms of banning diesel from their streets. Chicago has already regulated the sale of E15 fuel to minimize pollution. Your info reminds me of the the "science" that claimed Brazil's pollution was a direct result of high ethanol blends. Later the analysis looked at a period of history of high annual ethanol sales and low annual sales. Yup harmful pollution went up with more petrol fuel and down with more ethanol within congested cities. The problem of ethanol has always been what base stock the fuel is blended to. Meaning you can chemically engineer a horrible base stock and that is exactly the test fuel utilized within EPA. They let petrol design the test fuel at a incredible price tag.