Volkswagen Could Face $18 Billion Fine Over Emission-Cheating Software 471
After getting caught cheating on emissions testing by means of software, Volkswagen could face up to $18 billion in fines, reports USA Today. That number is based on the company being assessed the maximum penalty of $37,500 per affected vehicle. That's not the only bad news for Volkswagen, which has halted sales of its 4-cylinder diesel cars; the linked article reports that the violations "could also invite charges of false marketing by regulators, a vehicle recall and payment to car owners, either voluntarily or through lawsuits. Volkswagen advertised the cars under the 'Clean Diesel' moniker. The state of California is also investigating the emissions violations."
23% of the company (Score:5, Insightful)
For reference, $18B would be about 23% of the market cap of the company. In other words, if the company were to pay such a fine by issuing new stock and giving the stock to the government, the government would end up with 23% of the company (or so goes the math if the stock market were being logical).
That's not what's going to happen, but it shows that the company should be able to raise the money to pay the fine if it comes to it. Of course, such things usually take many years of lawsuits and appeals before it's all settled, which is why these things often are settled out of court for a lower price.
Re:23% of the company (Score:5, Insightful)
The $18B doesn't cover the cost of 500,000 customers who not only got ripped off, but also were exposed to dangerous levels of harmful fumes. This is a torts lawyer wet dream.
Re:23% of the company (Score:5, Insightful)
That seems like the sort of thing that might make them justifiably unhappy, and in a way with a relatively large, and relatively easily quantified, dollar value attached.
Re:23% of the company (Score:5, Informative)
According to the previous article about this, the cars are still LEGAL, they are just nowhere near as clean as they claim. It's not a "clean" or "dirty" question, all cars are dirty to a certain extent.
Re:23% of the company (Score:4)
According to the previous article about this, the cars are still LEGAL, they are just nowhere near as clean as they claim. It's not a "clean" or "dirty" question, all cars are dirty to a certain extent.
they are only legal because the alternative would be chaos
Re:23% of the company (Score:4)
The cars may be legal, but the sale of them, the misrepresentation involved in the sale was a fraud. Consumers paid their money for cars of a certain performance grade, and to make the cars legal will significantly lower that grade. Expect a very costly class action from customers who didn't get what was promised.
Re:23% of the company (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:23% of the company (Score:5, Informative)
According to the previous article about this, the cars are still LEGAL, they are just nowhere near as clean as they claim. It's not a "clean" or "dirty" question, all cars are dirty to a certain extent.
Uh, no.
During normal driving situations, the controls are turned off, allowing the cars to spew as much as 40 times the pollution allowed under the Clean Air Act, the E.P.A. said. [nytimes.com]
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People--laymen, folks like you and I, with no technical education on EPA pollution measurements or their reasoning--envision pollution as toxic, poisonous, choking smoke and sludge pumped into the atmosphere. Exhaust fumes that eat away your lungs by the fouling of burning ash and poisonous esters and hydrocarbons. Carcinogenic compounds that shred tissue, blacken water, kill birds, and rain down the sulfuric fury of acid rain.
NOx emissions are relatively harmless. NO emissions rapidly oxidize to NO2:
Re:23% of the company (Score:4, Informative)
most European standards are STRICTER than the American ones.
Not for diesels, which is what we are talking about here. In this case the American standards are stricter. You have to pull out some massive engineering mojo to make a diesel passenger car that's street legal in the US. Apparently VW doesn't have what it takes.
Re:23% of the company (Score:5, Interesting)
Not for diesels, which is what we are talking about here. In this case the American standards are stricter.
The American standards are different. They focus on emissions per gallon burned, not per mile traveled. I have yet to see a study which shows that this actually produces less pollution than the european standard, but I would be interested in such a thing.
To me, this is like the argument over THC and driving. OK, criminalize use before/while driving... if you can show that it causes accidents. Well, is this actually causing more pollution?
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Well it's not like gallons burned and miles traveled are unrelated concepts. A TDI Passat gets 25% better mileage than a 4 cylinder Passat. It evidently also pollutes more, although I'm not sure if it pollutes 25% more.
Re:23% of the company (Score:5, Informative)
Then you have misunderstood the EGR. What the EGR do is to recirculate some exhaust lowering the oxygen content in the combustion chamber, which in turn lowers the combustion temperature and result in a lower NOx level. The EGR gases are usually also cooled down before entering the intake.
The downside with a lower combustion chamber temperature is that the engine will provide less power as well, all according to the ideal gas law [wikipedia.org]. To compensate for this the boost pressure through a turbocharger is pretty high - newer engines conforming to the latest emission standards have a higher boost than previous generations - even up to 4 bar (4 atmospheres) boost. (way more than what a gasoline engine have)
On a diesel there's a catalytic converter to take care of some HC that may remain, but the primary objective is that there's a particle filter that catches most particles - where the majority are soot particles. This filter has to be regenerated at regular intervals which is done by injecting some additional diesel into the filter where it's ignited. However since the soot isn't entirely clean there's an accumulation of ash residue that requires a replacement of the filter at regular intervals - usually >= 100000 km.
In order to lower the NOx even more there's also on modern vehicles also an injection of a selective catalytic reagent (SCR), often named AdBlue or Diesel exhaust fluid (DEF) [wikipedia.org] (which is a clear water-based liquid containing urea [wikipedia.org]) into the exhaust system that combines with the NOx and other compounds in the exhaust fumes to produce nitrogen, carbon dioxide and water.
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I have yet to see a study which shows that this actually produces less pollution
https://www.dieselnet.com/standards/
Re:23% of the company (Score:5, Interesting)
Comment removed (Score:5, Funny)
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As far as you know is incorrect. (Score:3)
Jurisdictions_requiring_periodic_vehicle_emissions_inspections [wikipedia.org]
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The $18B doesn't cover the cost of 500,000 customers who not only got ripped off, but also were exposed to dangerous levels of harmful fumes. This is a torts lawyer wet dream.
Ripped off by getting better performance than they would have if the emissions controls were in 'test mode' all the time?
And, if you're worried about 'harmful fumes', you wouldn't have bought a stinky, polluting, smoke-spewing diesel in the first place.
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Ripped off by getting better performance than they would have if the emissions controls were in 'test mode' all the time?
ripped off by having engines that are running outside of their design envelope, with premature part failures and lower reliability
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ripped off by having engines that are running outside of their design envelope, with premature part failures and lower reliability
In what sense are they 'running outside of their design envelope'? Are you saying that this isn't an intentional piece of code, it's just a bug that they don't run in 'test mode' all the time, and VW didn't design them that way?
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In what sense are they 'running outside of their design envelope'?
Higher performance means higher internal engine stresses. Bearings, rings, seals, timing chains, etc. are subjected to higher stresses and fail sooner.
Are you saying that this isn't an intentional piece of code
No. Get a clue: VW has more than one employee. The CEO does not mind-meld with the software developers.
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Higher performance means higher internal engine stresses.
You have two choices here:
1. The engine is designed to run in 'test mode' all the time, and the code that allows it to run outside 'test mode' is a bug, or something some EVIL PROGRAMMER inserted because he wanted his car to go faster.
2. The engine is designed to run in normal mode all the time, and 'test mode' is a deliberate attempt to detune it for testing.
Which are you claiming to be true?
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"normal mode" is a lie, it's a fiction invented by a software developer, probably with the cooperation of higher-ups in order to sell a car that is not what it appears to be.
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"normal mode" is a lie, it's a fiction invented by a software developer, probably with the cooperation of higher-ups in order to sell a car that is not what it appears to be.
That's not an answer to my question.
You claim 'CRIMINAL FRAUD', so you must believe the 'test mode' is not the way the engine is designed to run. Yet you also claim that 'normal mode' is not the way the engine is designed to run. So why do you think VW would release a car that doesn't run the way it's designed to run?
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So why do you think VW would release a car that doesn't run the way it's designed to run?
$$$
or
DM DM DM
as the case may be.
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So, as far as I can make out, you seem to be claiming that VW released a car designed to be unreliable and break down, so they can make money on repairs?
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€ € € you mean. Germany hasn't used Deutchmarks since 1999.
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So, as far as I can make out, you seem to be claiming that VW released a car designed to be unreliable and break down, so they can make money on repairs?
that's one reason
another is that they tested the car with focus groups and the come-back was "it needs more power" and it is cheaper to fudge the software than it is to design a new engine
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So, as far as I can make out, you seem to be claiming that VW released a car designed to be unreliable and break down, so they can make money on repairs?
You've never worked on VW beetle, have you? They were designed to be as cheap and flimsy as possible. And with the poor oil flow to the valves, the Beetles were also DESIGNED to be unreliable. Do you hear that chirping sound from a VW beetle's exhaust? That sound is the valves grinding themselves away.
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http://www.volksworld.com/tech-guides/technical-information/air-cooled-vw-engine-oil-system-31531
"it took 40 years, and the advent of the so-called Type 4 engine, for VW to include a proper oil filter system in its design."
Re:23% of the company (Score:4, Interesting)
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That sound is from the exhaust design, not the engine design - attach the exhaust from a Porsche 356 or an aftermarket Bursch or Dansk and it will sound *much* better.
Now, if you hear one rattling like a drawer full of spoons that could be very loosely adjusted valves (iirc spec is a gap of 009 for push rods and valve rocker arms) or something funky happening with the generator pulley.
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the original point I was making is that VW has been selling questionable cars for many decades
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The CEO does not mind-meld with the software developers.
I'll have to search around a bit, but I do think I saw this on a porn tube . . .
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These were advertised and sold as "clean diesels". Presumably people who bought them thought they were buying a diesel that didn't pollute (much).
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Ripped off by getting something that pollutes more than advertised - and, presumably, will have less power than advertised if that issue is ever fixed.
And they didn't. They bought a clean diesel. Only it turns out it's not clean after all, because Wolkswage
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It also doesn't cover the cost of fixing the cars... if they can be fixed.
I assume that the reason VW resorted to fraud was that they couldn't make the cars run well while meeting emissions standards. If they "fix" the cars to make them meet the standards, they may not run very well (low power, starting problems, drivability issues, etc.). I can envision lots of irate customers whose cars no longer run well... VW may have to buy back these cars... that would cost a lot.
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If they "fix" the cars to make them meet the standards
They will probably run like the old diesel rabbits that they sold back in the 1980s. My boss had one and it literally would not make it up the hill with a full load of passengers. We got out and pushed.
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The $18B doesn't cover the cost of 500,000 customers who not only got ripped off, but also were exposed to dangerous levels of harmful fumes. This is a torts lawyer wet dream.
Just being in the USA is a torts lawyers wet dream.
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Used to be. But thank to the US Chamber of Commerce and their evil henchman, Karl Rove, the torts gravy train has come to a grinding halt.
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The $18B doesn't cover the cost of 500,000 customers who not only got ripped off, but also were exposed to dangerous levels of harmful fumes.
That's true. They will need $0 additional dollars to address the 0 customers who were exposed to dangerous levels of harmful fumes as a result of this decision. At least, that's what our own goverment says; out of one side of their mouth they say this is a public health issue, and out of the other side they tell us that the owners have not been exposed to anything harmful as a result. So which is it?
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No, if they wanted to pay the fine in newly-issued stock, the issuing of the new stock would dilute the value, so (assuming a logical market), they would have to issue enough to result in the government owning 23% of the company. That's not issuing 23% more stock, it's more like 30%.
Of course, the market isn't logical, so the real amount they would have to issue would be different. The point of my post is to put the size of the potential fine in perspective of the total value of the company. It implies t
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The government would not be putting any money in. Please explain how in accounting terms they would be able to add 23% to their market cap when they would not actually be receiving any money?
This would be a stock issue for 0 money into the company. A direct dilution.
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No, if they added 23% to their market cap, then gave that to the government, the government would own 18.7% of the company (23%/123% of the old market cap).
yeah, as if the stock value will remain the same after this
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Unless Volkswagen has a wildly dysfunctional development process, on a scale that would doom most attempts at engineering, building, testing, and shipping ECU firmware with test detection and cheating algorithms isn't exactly something that a single bad actor could plausibly pull off on his own initiative.
Unless the situation is somehow far more innocent than reports so far suggest; there should be a decent number of peop
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I figure it is exactly the same as the flap in the exhaust of my honda CBR1000rr that is closed until it passes the RPM required for the ride by noise test. Then magically it is opened by a cable to allow the exhaust to be freer breathing. Ofcourse Honda says it is for improved backpressure at low rpm but.....
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You're not using the right phrase here. That one refers to liabilities incurred by the owners of a corporation, which isn't something that normally happens. Judges can decide to do this based on things like material misrepresentations in corporate documents and the "absence of arm's length relationships", e.g. you start a corporation and then pay for personal items out of the corporate account.
What Volkswagen did all occurre
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Oh please it does not work that way and you know it. First off its always going to go on up the chain that way until it gets to the CEO.
The kind of person who would order the commission of such a fraud is by definition not the sort that will step forward during the finger pointing when it happens. This person is dishonest and the promise of hefty fines or jail isn't usually the sort of thing that gets the dishonest to suddenly come forward. So pretty much no matter what the most guilty party is going to
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I would prefer if fines were done by issuing stock to the government. Effectively it would devalue all currently held stock penalizing the stock holders who are the actual people where the "buck stops" and who have control over the board and the real direction of the company
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Why not personal financial culpability for the officers of the company? The fine is their personal responsibility to be paid from their own assets, up to and including all their personal property being auctioned off and the balance paid through onerous payments that guarantee a net income of no more than $40k per year until the fine is settled.
Bar any third party payments from insurance, corporate repayment or any other third sources. Garnish any cash payments to them from friends or family. Require ho
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The officers of the company most likely have no clue how the engine management software works. We don't even know if the managers in the engine management division knew. For that matter, we don't even know if they outsourced this component.
Re:23% of the company (Score:4, Interesting)
If stockholders held any actual power in a company, I'd be fine with making fines punitive for stockholders.
But we live in a world where senior management in collusion with the board have essentially stripped shareholders of any power. Most shareholder initiated proxies are non-binding, when they're allowed at all. Boards routinely rubber stamp management decisions-- mostly because they are so often comprised of managers from other companies (boards have more recursion than CompSci 3104).
The idea that officers don't know what might be happening seems a practical truth, but it flies in the face of stratospheric executive salaries justified with the general logic that CEOs and senior management are geniuses, singularly responsible for the success and advancement of their organizations. If they want to get paid as if that was true, they should face the concomitant assignment of responsibility.
Saying "they didn't know" seems to be a failure of management (the verb) -- failure to setup adequate reporting and oversight processes.
Further, in this specific case it seems unlikely that a rogue employee or even rogue engineering group would have been unlikely to be solely responsible. The scale of risk, cost remediation and fixing the problem (emissions) correctly seems to have been something that would have naturally bubbled up through management.
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No, I'm saying that if the market cap stays the same due to dilution, if they paid the fine in stock, the government would end up with 23% of the total.
Of course, markets aren't logical, so it's an academic argument. The point was to put the size of the potential fine in perspective with the size of the company.
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Market cap will spiral to earnings per share (or some number based on financial performance). The share has an inherent value. 100% of a company that makes $10B profit a year is worth $10B per year. That can't spiral to $0, as when it drops below the "value" someone will buy it up and turn your loss into a profit.
If you own
"could face up to $18 billion in fines" (Score:4, Insightful)
And a civilization-killer asteroid *could* crash into the Earth this evening. They're both equally unlikely.
Hang 'em high... (Score:5, Insightful)
Building ECU code specifically to deliver 'correct' results under test; and totally different results elsewhere, is going to be difficult to explain as an 'accident'; and also the sort of thing that it'd be pretty tricky for a single rogue actor to pull off without the knowledge, and probably the cooperation, of others on the design team and in management.
I realize that it is considered unspeakably barbaric to pierce the corporate veil and cruelly touch the people who actually made the decisions; but under any non-corporate circumstance I'd have to imagine that the prosecution would have a stack of conspiracy charges so thick that it has to be delivered by two burly paralegals, in addition to charges related to the violations themselves; and all the possible civil litigation on the part of the misled customers.
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This shows the foolhardiness of trying to legislate clean air. Alternative energy sources is the only real cure; make a set of criteria on paper (emissions levels or carbon credit trading) encourages fraud, and we already know billions of dollars of that kind of fraud is known. How much is unknown? We can trust in the power of the almighty buck and power grubbing scum to know even more is unknown.
We have algae that can turn cellulose grown on scrubland into a direct substitute for gasoline (butanol), w
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This shows the foolhardiness of trying to legislate clean air. Alternative energy sources is the only real cure
So you are callling for legislative action in the form of tax breaks in order to make alternative energy more affordable?
Re:Hang 'em high... (Score:5, Interesting)
We have algae that can turn cellulose grown on scrubland into a direct substitute for gasoline (butanol), we can make biofuel substitute for diesel. But there is no serious investment that way, only token efforts.
No, it's worse than that; Butamax, a holding company owned by BP and DuPont, managed to get a patent on the process for efficiently producing butanol and are now actively preventing Gevo (a GE energy ventures subsidiary) from making butanol fuel and selling it to the public, which they would like to be doing right now — on a small scale at first, but ramping up over time.
BP, some of the most evil fucks ever, and DuPont, more of the most evil fucks ever, are actively preventing us from having the best biofuel we could be burning.
Re:Hang 'em high... (Score:5, Insightful)
Legislating clean air has worked. Check out the air in Los Angles now versus 30 years ago.
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Legislating clean air has worked. Check out the air in Los Angles now versus 30 years ago.
Still ways to go - looking at the huge black clouds from diesel transport trucks going into the air at construction sites makes one wonder why this is happening. Fine dust particles staying in your lungs for good if you breathe that stuff in, which you do anyway.
The "Rolling Coal" movement is another fad going on raising questions about mental competence.
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Flying into LAX, you used to descended into a brown layer of smog during final approach. From anywhere along I-10 West of L.A. or CA-60 East of L.A., except for early morning you could only see the mountains to the north a few weeks out of the year. If you lived out near Riverside or San Bernardino, the day would start off with clear air, and about noon to 2pm, a thick grey-brown layer of smog would move in and drop visibility to 5-10 miles.
I'm cons
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Is there actually any law saying they can't run the car in a special 'test mode' when being tested? Or is this just Greenie butthurt feelbads?
With the really massive case of CRIMINAL FRAUD we are talking about here, that seems almost irrelevant.
Re:Hang 'em high... (Score:4, Insightful)
What CRIMINAL FRAUD?
people were sold automobiles that were claimed to be street legal, but they are not.
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Which law makes them not street legal?
emissions control laws, lots and lots of them
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To answer your question, yes the do actually have to meet the specs to be sold in the US.
But they meet the specs in the test. That's the whole point of the 'test mode' operation.
Is there a law which actually requires them to meet those specs outside of the test?
Hyundai was hit last year for fudging mileage numbers.
Which is something most car buyers actually care about.
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If you bring in a cheat sheet for a test in college and you get caught doing that, do you get to keep your A grade?
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If there was no consequence, I could sell you a $50,000 donkey, and claim it was a Lexus.
Re:Hang 'em high... (Score:5, Informative)
Yes, there is such a law. 40 CFR 86.1809-10 - Prohibition of defeat devices. So much for the "if it's legal it's wonderful" pseudo-argument.
Re:Hang 'em high... (Score:5, Interesting)
18 USC section 1031 [cornell.edu] would apply if Volkswagen obtained any EPA credits or other direct gain as a result of this testing.
I skimmed through the Federal Test Procedures, and didn't find an explicit rule saying "car should be in normal operating mode", however, I did not search exhaustively, and this is a SECRET mode. It isn't a turbo switch you push, it's picking up on the exact sequence of RPMs performed during FTP. It definitely violated the intent of the EPA regulations, which were explicitly stated to be "accurately simulating real-world conditions". There is no reason for this to exist except to sell cars that violate EPA regulations, and I don't think "you didn't write a law specifically against it" should stop them from getting fined.
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Yeah, it's called the Clean Air Act. It empowers the government to regulate auto emissions. Deliberately defeating a testing regime is fraud.
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Perhaps you think the cheating on airlines pilot test is also legal?
The law limits how much the cars are allowed to pollute, rather than state that they must pass a test. The test is merely considered proof that the cars are in compliance.
Just because you personally hate government doesn't mean government is as stupid as you think they are. While their are a few cases where people have been bribed to pass laws wi
Change of plans (Score:2)
Some unhappy intern will have to return all those Champagne bottles.
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I think I heard somewhere that this year they had finally surpassed Toyota as the largest car manufacturer in the world. This was supposed to have been a pretty good year for them.
They achived this through acquisitions, they aren't really making that many more cars. For example you are also counting Lamborghinis and Bentleys and Ducati motorcycles in your total.
Start tying nooses... (Score:2)
Someone's gonna be hanging.
If found guilty (which certainly looks to be the case) see a huge black eye to the industry, a huge fine (hopefully leveraged over years to avoid outright murdering the company but gutting profits), and ideally better testing a cheat prevention applicable to all other participants. Considering how few players are big in passenger vehicle diesel engines these days, it may just be the end of them as well.
California investigating (Score:5, Interesting)
"The state of California is also investigating the emissions violations"
Oh boy are they in trouble now. I've heard they're worse than the Feds when it comes to issues like these.
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Indeed. Even in the 80s California emissions laws kept certain models of cars from being imported, like hte Porsche 930 turbo. Hence the M491 option on the 911 (factory turbo look - a turbo car without the rear windshield wiper, or turbo script on the back end, and the NA 3.2L engine instead of the turbo charged version)
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Indeed. Even in the 80s California emissions laws kept certain models of cars from being imported, like hte Porsche 930 turbo. Hence the M491 option on the 911 (factory turbo look - a turbo car without the rear windshield wiper, or turbo script on the back end, and the NA 3.2L engine instead of the turbo charged version)
And in fact California is the very reason that manufacturers practically stopped selling diesel passenger vehicles in the United States to being with. They started coming back into style in the late 2000's after some law changes. But California has such strict emission standards that Subaru, for instance developed their PZEV technology. They entered into a compromise with the state of California so they could even have a chance to sell vehicles in the state without meeting all of the state's emission sta
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The car's clean enough not to make the person driving it sick. If everyone drove cars that cheated on emission standards, then sure, pollution would be a lot worse. But as a percentage of cars on the road, this model is a drop in the ocean. The more serious issue if you own this car is that it could cost hundreds or even thousands of dollars to make it street legal in California. If it can be made street legal at all.
Will other automakers sue VW? (Score:5, Interesting)
In October 2012 I bought a new car. it was a close decision between the VW Jetta TDI and Ford Fiesta. The slightly better highway mileage on the Jetta was the deciding factor for me.
Ford probably lost a sale because of this deception.
Re:Will other automakers sue VW? (Score:5, Insightful)
Jetta TDI vs Fiesta? Yeah, you probably ended up with the much better car regardless of the outcome of this issue.
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I still owe more than it is worth.
this is why it's profoundly stupid to buy a new car
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"They must sell different VW's in the states than here in Germany"
Exactly my view. If you look at American car forums about their opinion on European cars, be them VW, Audi, BMW or Mercedes (those make about 99% of what "European" they know about), you couldn't believe they are talking about the same cars running here. Where here you usually run any one of them 150, 200.000Km without major problems, just standard maintenance, it seems they break apart at 50.000 miles in USA! it must the weather or somethi
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Honda and Ford have already been under investigation for similar emissions manipulation. For 1.6 million affected cars, Honda paid a $12.6 million fine plus $250 million in remedial costs. Ford paid a $2.5 million fine plus $3.8 million in other costs for 60000 vans ( Source [nytimes.com]). The investigation into VW's manipulation is about roughly 500000 cars.
So, while I agree that these manipulations are despicable and beyond stupid, an $18 billion fine is not likely at all, and other automakers probably don't want to ro
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In October 2012 I bought a new car. it was a close decision between the VW Jetta TDI and Ford Fiesta. The slightly better highway mileage on the Jetta was the deciding factor for me.
Ford probably lost a sale because of this deception.
If it makes you feel any better, basically none of the Ford Ecoboost vehicles are coming anywhere near delivering their rated MPG.
+1 above: Clean Diesel is an oxymoron (Score:2)
Software update? (Score:2)
Does anyone have a link that describes how the testing operation works or some technical details on what is being tested and how?
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Here's a link.
http://bfy.tw/1tGv [bfy.tw]
The video on top explains most of the process.
I hope ... (Score:5, Funny)
Digging through several layers of links:
EPA and CARB uncovered the defeat device software after independent analysis by researchers at West Virginia University,
So it looks like WVU might have to bite the bullet on this one and the EPA will get off scott free. Sorry to all of you students who were hoping for your degree. After the school shuts down, maybe you can get jobs mining coal.
Many Nations (Score:3)
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I would assume that numerous nations
why would you assume this? USA has the most stringent diesel emissions requirements on the planet, these cars are probably perfectly legal in other parts of the world.
More to the point (Score:3)
VW diesel owners are unswervingly loyal and unswervingly proud of their purchase and the VW brand, and unanimously proud of doing the right thing ecologically, so this is like finding their wife committing adultery with their dog.
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Operative words there are 'so far'. This is some Dr. Evil style stuff, intentionally being criminal on a massive scale for profit, and if Volkswagen does it and gets away with it this long, other car companies must surely ask what they have to do in order to compete in the market with this sort of monster.
Race to the bottom (in diesel cars): they ALL have to start lying like rugs and making computers that cheat on tests, as much or worse than VW was doing.
That's unfettered market capitalism, and that is wha
Re: (Score:3)
That's unfettered market capitalism
Since when has the US and Europe had unfettered market capitalism? Hell, even in the 1800s there were all sorts of market protection laws and government grants to business.
Alternative is regulation and holding somebody accountable.
You forgot bribery and Communism.
Re:Off the roads, now! (Score:5, Informative)
They do not meet the requirements to be on the road and any use should be immediately prohibited
You realize a turn of the PREVIOUS century model T ford a meets the requirements to be on the road, and their idea of emissions control amounted to having the exhaust exit outside the vehicle instead of inside. There is a big difference between 'legal to drive on the street' and 'legal to register as a new vehicle'. And lots of cars that would NEVER EVER EVER pass modern rules for emissions, for safety, for anything are still perfectly legal to operate.
And hundreds of thosuands of vehicle owners have bought a new car, and then promptly had it retuned for performance. (One guess what that gain was at the expense of!) And in jurisidicitons where they need to get it tested periodically they'd even install switches to cut it back over for the test, to make sure they'd pass, then after exitting the test facility flip it back to fast+dirty.
Hell, you can buy aftermarket kits for this. And people 'chipping' their cars... etc, etc...
with VW ordered to repurchase all affected vehicles at original price and to pay all costs for replacement transportation until impacted drivers can obtain a US-legal alternative
Impacted drivers, by and large, probably want their TDI left exactly the way it is. TDI owners buy them for the excellent fuel efficiency and decent performance.
If there was a button in the car where they could push "better mileage, worse emissions" I'd bet most of them would have pushed it.
VW deserves to get slapped hard for this, what they did was brazen and deceptive... but lets not go off the deepend. They aren't gong to be hit for $37,000 per vehicle... at worst they'll settle for buying some extra carbon credits to offset the extra pollution they've caused, plus some punitive damages.
When called on it their response was, "well yes, the test definitions should be improved but it would be unfair to alter the standards without a few year advance notice."
Yup, gaming the testing standards is par for the course in every industry ever. And yes, the onus is on the regulatory body to change the test standards (or clarify them); and yes, a couple years lead time is both normal and the way it should be.
Re: (Score:2)
If there was a button in the car where they could push "better mileage, worse emissions" I'd bet most of them would have pushed it.
if the button told the truth and said "markedly reduced engine life" would people still be pushing it?