The American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy has released its annual study of the most and least environmentally friendly cars, and the diesel Volkswagen Touareg was ranked most harmful.

The ratings from the Green Book, The Environmental Guide to Cars & Trucks reaffirmed what we already knew -- domestic SUVs are the worst consumers of fuel and emitters of pollutants, while the most sustainable vehicles are all built outside of the U.S.

Two new vehicles, the Nissan Altima Hybrid and the Toyota Yaris were among the top 5 greenest vehicles, following the Honda Civic GX natural gas vehicle and the Toyota Prius and Honda Civic Hybrid, which have held the top three spots for several years.

The new generation of ultra low sulfur diesel vehicles rated surprisingly poor on the list, dominating the least friendly vehicles.

However, I'm not sure that the calculation includes the amount of energy used to create the fuel, since while diesel fuel releases more particulates, it also requires less feedstock and energy to produce the fuel.