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Volkswagen Is Ordered to Recall Nearly 500,000 Vehicles Over Emissions Software

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Keep in mind that the VW Group sells cars under the Audi, Bentley, Bugatti, Lamborghini, Porsche, SEAT, Škoda and Volkswagen marques;
motorcycles under the Ducati brand; and commercial vehicles under the MAN, Scania, Neoplan and Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles marques.

This could have a major impact on the entire European auto industry for many years to come.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_Group

In 2012, VW produced the second-largest number of motor vehicles of any company in the world, behind Toyota and ahead of General Motors.
It has maintained the largest market share in Europe for over two decades.
As of 2013, it ranked ninth in the Fortune Global 500 list of the world's largest companies.
In 2014, it reached production output of 10.14 million vehicles.


Let VW go bankrupt, take its equity to zero and give its bondholders 25 cents on the dollar, and then we'll give them a $900,000,0000 "easy ride".

AE in the UK is reporting that VW have stopped sales of some models in the US, so this is already costing direct $$$ in lost sales today.

It will be interesting to see how far this goes in Europe too.
I have to say that it is curious how no rival manufacturer has spotted this, or the implication is that maybe this deceit is more widespread, even if VW are the worst culprit.
It seems your testing regimes are much better in the US, we have to put up with ludicrous (soory) claims about 70+mpg on vehicles in brochures that barely reach 50mpg real world.
About time this was sorted too.

http://www.autoexpress.co.uk/volkswagen/92893/vw-halting-us-sales-of-diesel-models-after-accusation-of-cheating-emissions-test

 
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Maybe they calculated the risk, and thought it would be cheaper to set money aside for future legal settlements & buybacks, and just hope they got away with it for few years, than to actually invest (large amounts of) money into new Diesel tech that would do the job.

Someone made the decision to cheat, and I find it hard to believe that engineers made that decision.

I suspect that this was a "boiled frog" scenario. I imagine that this has been going on to varying degrees for years and I doubt that VW is the only one. There are many many cases where vehicles don't meet their advertised specs and everybody just accepts it.

I suspect that VW took it to a new extreme, maybe upset some bureaucrats, and have now been singled out as an example. I'm sure that all the other "clean diesel" manufacturers are sleeping a little rough right now.

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I have a very dear friend who used to work in the German auto industry at a VW supplier who, when I posted about this on Facebook, replied with a puzzled "but this is rubbish, of course everybody does this, it's how the game is played" kind of answer. This is a person I respect very much, and seeing that response drove home to me how deeply rotten the system must be.

This makes 100% sense to me. Somehow VW p'd off somebody in the US EPA and have been selected for execution.
 
The $18 billion fine would only be the beginning, since that's only the maximum amount they could owe the EPA. Every state and country Volkswagen does business in, and person who bought one of then vehicles included in this mess could be entitled to very significant damages. I wonder if Volkswagen is trying to do something like what BP did and will ultimately agree to pay anyone who can demonstrate they were harmed in any way by Volkswagens actions.
 
A good follow-up 10 questions and answers on the Green Car Reports website:
VW Diesel Emissions Recall: What You Need To Know In 10 Questions

My favorite part:
We suspect the EPA will want to put Volkswagen's rotting head on a pike on the walls of the town, to discourage the blatant, flagrant arrogance that the company appears to have displayed.

Kamala Harris is the current Attorney General in California. She is running for the U.S. Senate. She just essentially won that upcoming election. She is going to go after these guys so hard they will wish their heads were rotting on spikes in the Mohave desert. The talking heads on CBNC this morning were already playing down the possible fine, saying it would be just a "fraction" of the potential $18 billion number being thrown around. I'll be e-mailing Kamala, the Gov, and all my representatives shortly requesting the maximum possible penalty that the state of California can extract from these nitwits. I wouldn't be surprised if the state attempts to preclude the company from selling any cars in the state. This is unprecedented. There are a lot of people who are going to be very unhappy knowing that the VW's driving by their homes the last 7 years have been belching out 35x the amount of NOx allowable under the law.

They are done. Stick a fork in them. :mad:
RT

Great information in the referenced link - Thanks!
http://www.greencarreports.com/news...-recall-what-you-need-to-know-in-10-questions

{Quote deleted}
 
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Somehow VW p'd off somebody in the US EPA and have been selected for execution.
Or maybe it's bigger than we know...

<John Grisham mode on>

If you were a big oil company and wanted to stop or slow the adoption of EV's, how might you do it? Would you aim directly at the EV's, or somehow disable or disrupt the companies moving into that market? VW is perhaps the most committed to EV's of the three companies FlatSix911 mentioned. Toyota is obviously involved with them, but they're doing the Mirai and hybrids - pure EV vehicles from Toyota don't seem to be a threat yet. GM... well, they're GM. Not exactly known for innovation. VW....hmmm, if you could seriously damage their reputation and with it, their bottom line, you might slow things down. They're talking the talk with respect to EV's and have made big promises and produced a viable Golf EV. Discredit diesel (likely has poor profit margin anyway) and drive people back to gasoline, at the same time delaying VW's serious foray into EV's... all good. Learn that VW has slipped up and made themselves the perfect patsy... fortuitous timing.

<John Grisham mode off>

Of course, I'm NOT seriously suggesting this is the case, so let's not dissect the story line - I might want to sell it to Grisham!

This thread has such potential for FUD and conspiracy theories I thought it was past time to start something... :cool:
 
They've all been great cars, with great performance and economy. And owners are for the most part very devoted to their TDI's.

I think it will start some serious discussion, but it won't be enough to kill diesel all on its own.

We can say here, that energy density favors diesel over, say, using your Model X to haul an enclosed 8,000lb trailer. So, the V6’s aren’t in the spot-light, and won’t be going away. However, the 4’s are probably going to leave the United States. VW can’t afford to maintain the rate these cars will need service, with software telling them to clog up faster.

We own a 2.0 and I don’t share the devotion you are talking about. I have almost a full service setup, at home, Vag-Com diags, and everything I should need to take care of a TDI. I believe VW’s down-slope started with reliability issues, and disregard for customers. They designed a DPF filter in line with a Cat, and gave it one part number. It’s $2,900 (no labor). Never mind how other makers DPFs are serviceable (they open like cans, for cleaning). VW decided this unit would be sealed, and last 60k-140k, which has happened with very few exceptions.

I know we’re in “Tesla”-world, but think for a moment about getting a $5k bill, for your $23k TDI, every 100k miles. At best, you’ll think maintaining it is the price for “cleaning” that diesel conscience. Now that we know all these headaches were still violating federal law, we get to wonder just how much faster the non-urea car’s filters will clog $$. More soot in the turbo-chargers, more ash in the DPF, more fuel consumed and more CO2 out of the tail-pipe. This is how NOx evidently goes back down, and part of why people maintain “no such thing as clean diesel”. I would say that even if the system worked, the engineering behind it was poor.

Yesterday, I had to replace the 15A lighter fuse, in the Tesla.
 
this will have no affect on the company as long as they have 2nd row folding seats.

As for Model X seats, the seat "issue" will have zero affect on TSLA or Tesla. I don't understand how anyone can prioritize the "convenience" of a freaking folding seat over the environmental issues we are facing. I'm an optimistic person by nature but attitudes like the ones I'm seeing in the X forum this past couple of weeks diminishes that some what.

I know, I for one admit to being a terrible eco-terrorist due to my concerns of Model X's non-folding second row and potential delay in a better second row. :)

While I mull and discuss these concerns online, I will continue destroying the planet with my Model S P85 which does not have such concerns.

- - - Updated - - -

AE in the UK is reporting that VW have stopped sales of some models in the US, so this is already costing direct $$$ in lost sales today.

It will be interesting to see how far this goes in Europe too.
I have to say that it is curious how no rival manufacturer has spotted this, or the implication is that maybe this deceit is more widespread, even if VW are the worst culprit.
It seems your testing regimes are much better in the US, we have to put up with ludicrous (soory) claims about 70+mpg on vehicles in brochures that barely reach 50mpg real world.
About time this was sorted too.

http://www.autoexpress.co.uk/volkswagen/92893/vw-halting-us-sales-of-diesel-models-after-accusation-of-cheating-emissions-test



Well, some in Europe are already calling the VW case protectionist by the U.S. No idea if it could be so, how much that silently plays into how companies are treated, just saying that the American mindset may not travel quite as easily to the diesel-buying public in Europe. Mere cultural suspicion may play a part in that, just like the reverse happens over the pond.

The effects of this will be dire for VW and Audi - and diesel - in the U.S. Very hard to say if they are significant at all in Europe, beyond stock and fiscal repercussions. People may not change their habits that easily, just because some organization they've never heard of in a foreign country made some findings and issued some fines.

- - - Updated - - -

A good follow-up 10 questions and answers on the Green Car Reports website:
VW Diesel Emissions Recall: What You Need To Know In 10 Questions

My favorite part:
We suspect the EPA will want to put Volkswagen's rotting head on a pike on the walls of the town, to discourage the blatant, flagrant arrogance that the company appears to have displayed.

Kamala Harris is the current Attorney General in California. She is running for the U.S. Senate. She just essentially won that upcoming election. She is going to go after these guys so hard they will wish their heads were rotting on spikes in the Mohave desert. The talking heads on CBNC this morning were already playing down the possible fine, saying it would be just a "fraction" of the potential $18 billion number being thrown around. I'll be e-mailing Kamala, the Gov, and all my representatives shortly requesting the maximum possible penalty that the state of California can extract from these nitwits. I wouldn't be surprised if the state attempts to preclude the company from selling any cars in the state. This is unprecedented. There are a lot of people who are going to be very unhappy knowing that the VW's driving by their homes the last 7 years have been belching out 35x the amount of NOx allowable under the law.

They are done. Stick a fork in them. :mad:

RT

I'm not usually a violent person, but this greed and deceit is making me want to suggest the application of other nitrogen compounds to the guilty parties.

Compounds like ammonia, and urea, and nitric acid. ಠ_ಠ

Hyperbole much?
 
...Well, some in Europe are already calling the VW case protectionist by the U.S. No idea if it could be so, how much that silently plays into how companies are treated, just saying that the American mindset may not travel quite as easily to the diesel-buying public in Europe. Mere cultural suspicion may play a part in that, just like the reverse happens over the pond.

The effects of this will be dire for VW and Audi - and diesel - in the U.S. Very hard to say if they are significant at all in Europe, beyond stock and fiscal repercussions. People may not change their habits that easily, just because some organization they've never heard of in a foreign country made some findings and issued some fines...

seems even the UK might be waking up to the severity of this (whether they have the cajones to do anything about it is another matter altogether)
The big difference in the UK is the number of diesel vehicles on the road and overall traffic density which is way higher that the US, so potential health problems here are probably orders of magnitude higher.

incredibly damning exerpt ...

Air pollution is thought to account for 30,000 deaths each year in Britain.
But health experts have long argued that there is far too much nitrogen oxide (NOx) in the air for car industry emissions figures to be accurate.
They claim levels should have halved in recent years and yet they have remained stubbornly high.

“Volkswagen seems unlikely to be the only manufacturer attempting to game their emissions in this sort of way."

Professor Alastair Lewis, University of York

In Britain and the rest of Europe, all new diesels should have met the Euro 6 emissions standard from September 1 but a recent report by campaigners Transport & Environment (T&E) found just one in 10 complied.

One BMW was pumping out more than 10 times the legal limit of nitrogen oxide.


If more manufactures are drawn into the scandal it could lead to millions of cars, which have been bought in Britain over the last six years, being recalled.

Greg Archer, T&E’s clean vehicles manager said: “The Volkswagen example is clearly just the tip of the iceberg and there will be a lot more companies dragged into this.
“Exactly the same technology is used in Europe as it is the US, and tens of millions of cars have been sold since 2009.
“That means that there are potentially millions of cars that are being driven illegally. Obviously it is not the drivers’ fault, but it is likely we will see huge numbers of recalls.”



http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/road-and-rail-transport/11880790/volkswagen-emissions-scandal-illegal-cars.html





 
Or maybe it's bigger than we know...

<John Grisham mode on>

If you were a big oil company and wanted to stop or slow the adoption of EV's, how might you do it? Would you aim directly at the EV's, or somehow disable or disrupt the companies moving into that market? VW is perhaps the most committed to EV's of the three companies FlatSix911 mentioned. Toyota is obviously involved with them, but they're doing the Mirai and hybrids - pure EV vehicles from Toyota don't seem to be a threat yet. GM... well, they're GM. Not exactly known for innovation. VW....hmmm, if you could seriously damage their reputation and with it, their bottom line, you might slow things down. They're talking the talk with respect to EV's and have made big promises and produced a viable Golf EV. Discredit diesel (likely has poor profit margin anyway) and drive people back to gasoline, at the same time delaying VW's serious foray into EV's... all good. Learn that VW has slipped up and made themselves the perfect patsy... fortuitous timing.

<John Grisham mode off>

Of course, I'm NOT seriously suggesting this is the case, so let's not dissect the story line - I might want to sell it to Grisham!

This thread has such potential for FUD and conspiracy theories I thought it was past time to start something... :cool:

Damn. I was catching up with this thread and was going to drop the same conspiracy theory in.
 
Give me a break. GM's ignition key defect was a lethal defect and it should have been given immediate attention. More than a hundred people died and GM was let off with a slap on the wrist. It's funny how it is mostly foreign companies like BP, BNP, Toyota etc. that get hit by massive fines and bad publicity by puffed up US officials while US companies get an easy ride. Perhaps it's the fault of European and Asian countries to let the US get away with it. For each of these US stunts American companies abroad should be hit in an equal manner. There are plenty of justifications for doing so. Massive misconduct by US financial companies and the blatant violations of data protection and privacy rules by "tech" companies, just for a start.

Lets also wait and see how the European authorities will deal with VW.
 
I started to look at the emissions standards, but the EPA information on this is a bit dense. They talk about emissions factors and calculations, but I don't yet see how to get to amount/distance.

However, this is interesting as found on SpeakEV.com:
http://www.theicct.org/sites/default/files/publications/ICCT_NOx-control-tech_revised 09152015.pdf

This discusses the proposed changes in emissions requirements in the EU and the impacts on existing diesels. It has testing information which is quite interesting. The worst offenders use the same kind of emissions controls as the VW's under recall in the U.S. called LNT. In that test, it was Renault, Volvo, and Hyundai while VW and Audi fared poorly but not that bad. The 3 worst were emitting at 553 mg/km and 1167 mg/km, or 0.885 g/mi to 1.87 g/mi.

I was wondering how bad a Tesla would fare on 100% coal.

According to this article: America's Best Coal Plants - Power Engineering

The average NOx emissions for a coal plant in the U.S. in 2013 was 1.97 lbs/MWh. That's 893.6 grams/MWh, or 0.894 grams/kWh. Assuming a Model S gets 350 Wh/mi plus 10% charging inefficiency + 6% transmission/distribution losses (source: EIA), we're talking about 2.4 miles to a kWh. So that's 0.373 g/mi. That's not terrific at 100% coal, but not too terrible either. The best coal plants are about 4-6x lower than that though. My local coal plant is only 0.48 lbs/MWh, so if I charged exclusively off that, the NOx emissions would be 0.09 g/mi.

However, that's a real world value. That's not using NEDC cycle, unlike the vehicles in the test. On an NEDC cycle, the Model S 85 kWh gets about 312 miles of range. That's a factor of 1.177 over EPA which is 38 kWh/100 mi, or 380 Wh/mi but that includes charging losses. So the result is 341 Wh/mi, or a end result of 0.305 g/mi. Again, my local coal plant would make that 0.073 g/mi.

In summary, NOx emissions:
EPA Tier 2 Bin 5 limit: 0.031 g/mi
proposed Euro 6 limit: 0.128 g/mi
Worst diesel tested: 1.87 g/mi
3rd worst diesel tested: 0.885 g/mi
Model S 85, real world USA 100% coal avg: 0.373 g/mi
Model S 85, NEDC USA 100% coal avg: 0.305 g/mi
Model S 85, real world Chesterfield, VA coal: 0.09 g/mi
Model S 85, NEDC Chesterfield, VA coal: 0.073 g/mi

Note that coal for electricity production was 39% in the USA as a national average in 2014. The amount of coal for electricity production varies considerably depending on your regional electric power market.

It would be great if someone would double check my calculations.
 
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Hyperbole much?

Uh, no Hyperbole here at all AR...

<rant>
I'll go on the record and state that VW, the company, will be bankrupt within two years. Like I said. This is unprecedented. Drastic actions call for drastic measures. The Governor of California is absolutely dead serious when it comes to climate change, public health, the environment in general, and the future of the planet and all those that happen to occupy it now and in the future. If you think for one minute that this isn't going to be the biggest s**tstorm that ever hit VW, you have a lot to learn about how things work here.

Jerry is somewhat disappointed he didn't make the Oval Office the 3 times he tried. Nothing would make him happier than turning all the resources at his disposal to make an example of these knuckle heads, who apparently have no regard for what their products are doing to the environment. Apologies aren't going to cut it I'm thinking.

</rant>

RT

They are done. Two years. I'll bet all my TSLA stock on it. And I'll also put a little extra money on the December 2016 Chapter 7 call options :wink:

Jerry Letter.jpg
 
I agree that the 2l TDI is done... possibly all VW diesels... but VW is a HUGE... HUUUUUGE company worth ~$400B (assets not stock value). Worst case they could pay $16B in fines... buy back every effected TDI and still soldier on.

IMO good riddens... the demise of 'clean diesel' is one less FUD talking point. Bring on the eGolf.