VW faking emissions tests in USA?

[sailorbob]

Have VW defrauded governments and customers - probably not. There are tests that their vehicles have to pass which do not reflect real world driving and they found a way of passing those tests. They probably haven't broken any laws in doing this in most countries. So, people say, lets introduce real world tests and then we'll find that most of the vehicles cannot pass them. Also real world tests aren't going to be very good unless you test a vehicle with several thousands of mile of use to expose the effects of wear on the engine and emissions equipment.

[Stubox]

He got the payout for getting Vw share prices up from 2011 to an all time high and helping create a global automotive powerhouse. But it was on his watch that his engineers screwed up, so he takes the fall. As has been said its quite possible he knew little about it. Note for no apparent reason in June head of Audi power train, Stefan Knirsch , resigned and of course since then we have had the R and D heads also go. 

Of course it's pretty appalling what they did, but I'll still buy a VAG product , as much as I've a whole stack of Apple products probably constructed in some dodgy factory in China somewhere or shoes possibly made in a sweatshop in India.  

Will they be the last corporation to cheat in certain things.....doubtful.....

 

[Jacques]

If lot's of Companies, big or small, cheats, don't care about environmental matters, helth of employees or the general public, or creates advanced ways to go around test-procedures, does that mean, that we, the public should just accept that conduct?

Does the fact that thousands of small girls and boys in Pakistan and India are wraped every year mean, that that behaviour should be accepted as normal?

Does vw's very frequent use of East European as well as other Young women as prostitutes mean, that those many Young women should feel happy, that vw will support them in their current way of life in Germany (and India)?

Does VW's involvement with very shady persons in Angola mean, that we, the public, should willingly accept that, just because one may like their cars?

Does the huge scandal in the vw Group in 2005 with lot's of use of prostitution, human traficking, drugs etc. mean, that we the public should accept that as normal and perfectly acceptable Company culture?

I, for one, will not accept that behaviour from vw group, even though I may realise, that they are far from being the first Company in history, WHO may do such Things. So I will write a letter to vw stating that I will no longer buy a vw group car, and I shall be happy to explain them in details why.

Jacques.

Edited September 27, 2015 by Jacques

[C8RKH]

The truth is that in any given company you will find some senior manager who is willing to break laws and regulations for his own career, but its very unlikely that the CEO would be involved. Challenge is finding the culprits and the establishing a culture that uncovers such crimes before they hit the market. 

I think both Banking and Enron taught us that qite often CEO, and more often the CFO, know exactly what is going on.

If they don't, they have failed in a fundamental aspect of their job with oversight and governance, unless of course, it was deliberately hidden from them and that that is Fraud.

Let's stop making / giving excuses to these shits and start putting them in jail. Simples.

[Bibs]

What law have they broken out of interest? Is it fraud and if so, is the CEO directly responsible if the individuals who did it are identified?

[Barrykearley]

That's exactly the issue - ignorance cannot be classed as an excuse - you take the huge salaries - there has to be strings attached to it. 

In a court of law, for is minions , ignorance is not a defence - for these shitbags - it should not be either.

i hope the spaces in Guantanamo the yanks have freed up will be full of vw execs in the next few months!!! Water board the gits senseless 

[Jacques]

Sorry friends, as I've said before; they are above the law.

Jacques.

[swindon_alan]

I just laugh at this. Not because of VW/BMW/Audi or whoever but because of the complete eco-bollocks that brought this about. It's politician greed inspired in the first place, a gravy train of knob end researchers claiming their ridiculous grants to make up rubbish about nonsense because of the likes of Al Gore.

Let's demonize a gas that I (and every living being) exhales, that every plant feeds on and which is a minuscule component of the atmosphere.

Human beings and their technology and emissions are a pimple on the arse of a mosquito in terms of this planet. Yet the majority gulp down the propaganda of everyday news and believe it as fact.

Here's some facts.

What is wrong with the CO2 argument? Well most people have no understanding of climate science overall or the facts about CO2. The IPCC have also effectively made it the sole cause of climate change. AGW advocates and governments talk about reducing greenhouse gases, but they mean CO2. Few know it is less than 4% of all the greenhouse gases and the human portion is just a fraction of the 4%. Indeed, the amount we produce is within the error factor of the estimates of three natural sources.

CO2 EMISSIONS :

1. Respiration Humans, Animals, Phytoplankton 43.5 - 52 Gt C/ year

2. Ocean Outgassing (Tropical Areas) 90 - 100 Gt C/year

3. Volcanoes, Soil degassing 0.5 - 2 Gt C/ year

4. Soil Bacteria, Decomposition 50 - 60 Gt C/ year

5. Forest cutting, Forest fires 0.6 - 2.6 Gt C/year

Anthropogenic emissions (2005) 7.5 - 7.5 Gt C/year

TOTAL 192 to 224 Gt C/ year

The table shows the range of estimates of natural CO2 and human production in 2005 (Gt C/year is Gigatons of Carbon per year). Accuracy has not improved since. Notice the human contribution is within the error range of three (1, 2, & 4) of the natural sources. The total error range is almost 5 times the amount of total human production. If we play the carbon tax game we can reduce that by 50 percent to 3.75 Gt C/year net because we remove half of what we produce through agriculture and reforestation. In other words, if everyone left the planet but one scientist remainedto measure the difference in atmospheric CO2 she would not be able to measure any difference.

Edited September 27, 2015 by swindon_alan

[ramjet]

Do existing cars that have the defeat software in them now become illegal to drive as they do not comply?

Does that responsibility fall to the owner?

They bought the car essentially under false pretences didn't they?

I also just thought, what if all the VW dealers knew?

Edited September 27, 2015 by ramjet

[C8RKH]

I just laugh at this. Not because of VW/BMW/Audi or whoever but because of the complete eco-bollocks that brought this about. It's politician greed inspired in the first place, a gravy train of knob end researchers claiming their ridiculous grants to make up rubbish about nonsense because of the likes of Al Gore.

Let's demonize a gas that I (and every living being) exhales, that every plant feeds on and which is a minuscule component of the atmosphere.

Human beings and their technology and emissions are a pimple on the arse of a mosquito in terms of this planet. Yet the majority gulp down the propaganda of everyday news and believe it as fact.

Here's some facts.

I get what you are saying with this and have thought for a long time the whole "Eco" thing is crap - wind farms are not efficient and take a huge amount of carbon to make but this is never factored in to the arguments for and against - everyone wants cheap energy, so the Government cuts the subsidies for wind and PV to help to lower the price and then they are demonised for attacking "green" - it is not just Governments who are trying to fool people!

Why is the argument being brought back to "green" issues or to "mpg" issues, this is just losing focus in the thread. The point for me is simple. The rules of the game where you can produce as many diesel engined cars as you want, no restrictions, however you need to fairly and accurately report the emissions they produce, we will check what you say and will tell you how we will check for transparency, and as a result your vehicle will be taxed accordingly and the buyer will pay that tax.  That is simple to get and simple to understand. Forget about about the other arguments re green, the tests not being real world, etc - they are all just smoke.

VW accepted these rules and then deliberately set out on a course of action, that was known about and endorsed by the Corporate entity (suppliers notified, whistleblower silenced etc.), to falsify the test results.  That's it, plain and simple. That's what they did. In doing so, they manipulated the tax system to ensure that their vehicles were more favourably taxed which in turn reduce the tax take to Governments. What would you call that?

In taking this course of action, they knowingly miss-represented key facts and figures around the performance of their cars, which they knew were used to influence the consumer base in the decisions they made of which vehicle to buy in the VW range, and also, whether to buy VW or another brand. This gave them an unfair advantage over the competition (who may also have been cheating but not as good as VW - think of Lance Armstrong before he was caught  - a lot were doing it at the time, not just him) and causing them to lose sales, and possibly market share which impacted on their revenues and may or may not have caused job losses etc.

What ever you want to call it, morally and ethically it was wrong and they should be punished for THEIR actions and decisions. End of in my book. Slam Dunk. Guilty as charged, unless they can provide evidence of cause to prove they are innocent, which should be considered fully, before any final decision is made.

If we continue to make excuses, then unethical behaviour is rewarded and the cycle continues until it gets to the point we can no longer believe anything. Where do we draw the line, say enough is enough, and really start holding the corporate players to account?

I'm not naive, nor am I any sort of a legal expert or a saint and my information is only gleaned from the News - which I would argue is subject to the same sort of manipulation and miss-reporting as it would appear VW cars are on emissions testing.    I would just like to see the truth come out, guilty or innocent, and would like to see a return to common business good sense, the end to manipulation and short term thinking, so we get back to having companies and corporations that we well run, well funded and that plan for and think on a timescale longer than the next quarter's earnings call. I'm off to take my pills and medication now, I feel I am drifting into a utopian world dream.....

Edited September 28, 2015 by C8RKH

[Barrykearley]

VW have simply been making cars to evade tax test laws - that's wrong. 

Lets not pull into different threads or argument a about merits of green things and the like. It's all too easy to make excuses to undermine what they have done, that's what lawyers are for. In the real world it's just wrong.....

It will be interesting to see if there is a real sting in he tail for VW. The best outcome would be millions of people refusing to buy VW 

[MikieP]

What about all the tons of released particulates and other gasses now out there due to this fiasco that should not be? No one has seen fit to address that here (US) in our news as yet other than the ~18B penalty that might not ever become reality. And the current owners get to continue driving these pig diesels anyway spewing 40x what is allowed? VW should have to buy them back at MSRP and get them off our roads.

[Barrykearley]

I'd like to see Greece sending them all back as well. Should pretty much clear the debt they have with Germany !!

[Chillidoggy]

All the VW cars passed the tests at the time, so I blame the testers for not being smart enough to realise.

[sailorbob]

It is not just VW diesels that do not meet the emissions limits. There were cars from different manufacturers that failed too in the independent tests that led to VW admitting their software behaved differently during the government test.

[MikieP]

Test? By whom? These are ALL VW self-certified cars. We believed what VW certified in their results. Yes, a mistake that we should trust people where money and profits are concerned. Their own engineers (VW) that devised the cheat? Our emissions testers here (US) that were not able to talk to the car's on-board code to see what was happening while the car sat in the test lane and reset the engine parameters on the fly? The sole fault for the fraud lies with VW, and only VW. Yes, our EPA is slow but thorough. Sort of like the EU support of the fleeing millions from death going on now. Reports here say the CEO admitted he knew of the code manipulations, so did he? If so, jail is his only future as well as for all that took part that can not prove they were forcibly required to not report the fraud. It is pretty simple IMHO but it never works out that way. Destruction of the cars after a buy back would be good for the Group as well. Anyways, we have our own total pieces of shite here, look up Martin Shkreli.

 

Derek,

All reported here so far all the 500K diesels I think.

Edited September 28, 2015 by MikieP

[Barrykearley]

All the VW cars passed the tests at the time, so I blame the testers for not being smart enough to realise.

that's a bit like blaming the police for all crime!!

[C8RKH]

What about all the tons of released particulates and other gasses now out there due to this fiasco that should not be? No one has seen fit to address that here (US) in our news as yet other than the ~18B penalty that might not ever become reality. And the current owners get to continue driving these pig diesels anyway spewing 40x what is allowed? VW should have to buy them back at MSRP and get them off our roads.

What about them? They're released and hanging around. Tough.

I agree though that people who bought a VW under the false information should have the option to have VW buy the car back at full market value with a significant contribution, for each car bought back, to a Carbon Capture / Carbon programme to repair some of the damage caused if that satisfies your green leanings. But then, what will VW do with all these cars? The storing, dismantling, destruction of so many cars, before their useful end of life would be a eco / green catastrophe surely?

The damage has  been done,  not easy to unravel, hence my strong stance that they should be treated with the full authority and extent of the law.

that's a bit like blaming the police for all crime!!

Yup - and that's why we are in this mess as it seems the modern way to just effectively say "oh dear, they got caught, never mind, try harder next time and don't be stupid enough to get caught" - we do this with all criminals these days as it helps to keep the figures in the right quartile!

[sailorbob]

The government tests are performed by the government themselves or by certified independent testers.

Anyway, it's not all doom and gloom at least the extra NOx has help repair the hole in the ozone 

[Chillidoggy]

that's a bit like blaming the police for all crime

Like the crims, motor manufacturers have been at it for years, so the authorities need to be ever more proactive and smart in rooting out such things instead of sitting on their fat arses. The famous (or rather, infamous) example is the Ford Pinto in the U.S. whereby it was cheaper for Ford to pay out the victims than recall the cars and actually fix the problem. There has also been a recent TV programme about manufacturers designing cars and safety systems just to pass the 5-Star tests, rather than being more concerned about the safety of the occupants in a crash, I cannot recall the manufacturer, though.

Given the car manufacturers' track record, (we know they're going to cheat), then I believe that complacency on the part of the testers, and the non 'real-world' tests they'd devised, is where the blame should lie. What I'm saying is that with decent tests, VW shouldn't have been able to cheat in the first place, and trusting them not to cheat was plain stupid.

That doesn't mean I condone what VW has done, it's wrong, but then I don't expect high moral standards from corporations, history is littered with examples of wrong-doing by them.

[LotusLeftLotusRight]

I've got a much simpler solution for VW.

They should instruct all TDi owners to drive with the driver's door open, thereby triggering the ECU in to thinking it's being emissions-tested at all times.

They could even design and market a special door-ajar retaining bracket, for those who don't want to hold the door open manually. At the end of each journey the bracket could then be detached and used as a selfie-stick.

Win, win I think.

[Chillidoggy]

While they're at it, can you ask them to fix the indicators on Audis?

Thanks.

[LotusLeftLotusRight]

 

While they're at it, can you ask them to fix the indicators on Audis?

Thanks.

Fat chance!

Some things just can't be fixed.

[Kimbers]

The truth is that in any given company you will find some senior manager who is willing to break laws and regulations for his own career, but its very unlikely that the CEO would be involved. Challenge is finding the culprits and the establishing a culture that uncovers such crimes before they hit the market. 

Quote from MJK: "There is no way that ANY engineer involved in the design, manufacture or production of the car would not know this was fitted. It is impossible to believe that it was isolated to a few "rogue elements. This would have been approved at the very highest level". He also said that the Board would have been involved as it is such a huge decision and that if the CEO didn't know then he was not fit for the post.

Likewise I find it impossible that this was not a company decision. Incidently, to show you the sheer arrogance of both VW and the German Political machine, I have heard that Angela Merkel has been on the phone to several European leaders to express her concern that they fine VW for "an isolated issue of a few" and that they "consider the effects" of punishing VW excessively. A political threat? You decide.

What law have they broken out of interest? Is it fraud and if so, is the CEO directly responsible if the individuals who did it are identified?

American Emission laws are very strict so definitely broken those. Plus there will be shouts of defrauding government departments like HMRC and other tax governing departments in EU countries.

Edited September 28, 2015 by Kimbers

[Escape]

Have VW defrauded governments and customers - probably not. There are tests that their vehicles have to pass which do not reflect real world driving and they found a way of passing those tests. They probably haven't broken any laws in doing this in most countries. So, people say, lets introduce real world tests and then we'll find that most of the vehicles cannot pass them. Also real world tests aren't going to be very good unless you test a vehicle with several thousands of mile of use to expose the effects of wear on the engine and emissions equipment.

I tend to agree. Not to condone what VW have done, but it all depends on the way the emission regulation are phrased exactly.

If the law states a car must not exceed emissions in a specific test and/or will be taxed based on the outcome of a particular test, it is only logical that manufacturers will seek to optimize their cars for that particular test. Which can mean different gearing for higher mpg in the combined test, or an engine management that will minimize emissions during a test. Everybody accepts that if the car is driven spiritedly, the engine will emit more. Not just because it uses more fuel; but also because the management will be different at higher loads and rpm, and even some mechanical parameters will change. This can include a very wide range of factors: a enriched mixture, variable valves, exhaust configurations, increased redline, increased boost pressure and so on. I don't want to sound like the devil's advocate (though apparently the pay is real good), but is an Exige for example tested in Tour or Race and are the emissions the same? Many sporty cars have some sort of performance setting these days. We all accept those things, because they offer better performance which is what most want (in one way or the other). VW took this to a different level, but if the law only states compliance with the test for a vehicle 'in the configuration as used on the road', it would be hard to make any charges stick. Yes it could be called deception, but to be fair, there is little or no damage for the individual customer (unless governments start claiming lost taxes or such). Most owners will not be bothered by the NOx emissions of their car. They will look at mpg, but that would have benefited from the different software settings. One could argue mankind as a whole is a victim of the increased emissions, but again that would put the responsibility with the governments that came up with the legislation that requires cars to conform in a test environment, without necesseraly complying in real world usage.

Filip