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General Motors - which knew about their broken ignition switches for over a decade - got away with a 900$m fine. That defect killed at least 124 people.

by _yy 11y ago

ams6110 11y ago
And they got bailed out by the US taxpayers. I am just astonished at the outrage over some skirting of an arbitrary number in an emissions standard, in contrast to the comparative yawn over the things other automakers have done that they knew would actually kill people.
- lm______ 11y ago
  Polluting the environment kills people too.
  - kuschku 11y ago
    And CO2 kills also people. VW's cars had far lower CO2 emissions than competitors.
    - Mikeb85 11y ago
      That remains to be seen. CO2 is fairly innocuous, and already makes up a large percent of the volume of air. It's theorized that it leads to climate change (that being said, 8000 years ago Europe was also in an ice age, yet it thawed without mankind's help), but for the present time the amount of deaths that can be directly blamed on CO2 from cars (remember, people and animals create more CO2 than vehicles) is non-existent. Even if mankind's CO2 use does tip the scale enough to definitively kill millions, more CO2 is produced from power plants, ships, industrial ranching and burning forests than is produced by cars (especially VW cars). On the other hand, the other gases released by diesel-burning automobiles do show direct health consequences, and VW has done the most to propagate diesel vehicles...
      - hengheng 11y ago
        > CO2 is fairly innocuous, and already makes up a large percent of the volume of air. 397 ppm, to be exact, or 0.0397%.
      - dragonwriter 11y ago
        > CO2 is fairly innocuous, and already makes up a large percent of the volume of air. Its fairly innocuous at naturally occurring levels, which are not a "large percent" of the air. Nitrogen, Oxygen, and -- if you want to be extremely generous and say that "almost 1%" is "a large percent" -- Argon are the only things that have a remotely plausible case for being a large percent of the atmosphere, and together make up around 99.9%. Carbon dioxide makes up a large percent of the remaining ~0.1%, but...
- DanBC 11y ago
  Diesel emissions kill tens of thousands of people each year. It's probably hundreds of thousands across Europe. VW's scam has added to those deaths. VW killed far more than 150 people.
  - autobahn 11y ago
    [Citation Needed]
    - DanBC 11y ago
      Air pollution kills 60,000 people per year: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/air-pollution-to-blame-for-60000-early-deaths-per-year-government-to-be-warned-9893810.html http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/air-pollution... NO2 kills about 2,600 people each year in London. > The effects of the gas are particularly pronounced in London, where the Greater London Authority already recognises that it prematurely kills 2,600 Londoners each year; http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/car-manufacturers/volkswagen/11899676/The-statistics-about-diesel-are-crystal-clear.-Its-deadly.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/car-manufacturers/volksw... Across Europe this is easily tens of thousands of people and it's easily an order of magnitude over 150.
      - LoSboccacc 11y ago
        NOx emission from road cars is only a percentage of air NOx > like, 34% [1] VW market share is about 20% of that [2] so about 4000 deaths if they polluted their fair share, but since they polluted 20% to 40% more that's about 2000/year additional deaths? numbers are all over the place however, too many uncertainties and unmeasurable factors. also my number doesn't come anywhere close to other estimates[3] [1] http://uk-air.defra.gov.uk/assets/documents/reports/aqeg/nd-summary.pdf http://uk-air.defra.gov.uk/assets/documents/reports/aqeg/nd-... [2] http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/UK-market-share-2014.png http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/... [3] http://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-estimate-the-death-toll-of-the-volkswagen-emissions-cheating-scandal http://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-estimate-the-death-to...
  - 11y ago
- barkingcat 11y ago
  Just because no number of people were killed at present doesn't mean it's not a serious offense.
happyscrappy 11y ago
VW fraud likely killed almost one hundred Americans but far more Europeans. http://www.ibtimes.com/volkswagen-diesel-scandal-2015-emissions-likely-killed-94-people-us-analysis-shows-2125805 http://www.ibtimes.com/volkswagen-diesel-scandal-2015-emissi...
- kuschku 11y ago
  And probably saved equally many lives, by reducing CO2 per kilometer by almost 20%.
mladenkovacevic 11y ago
I also recall the problems with exploding Firestone tires on specifically Ford vehicles from the early 2000's that probably killed around 250 people and injured thousands. Firestone was fined $500,000 and I can't seem to find a record of Ford being fined anything except settling and losing as well as losing a couple of lawsuits as a result of it.

General Motors - which knew about their broken ignition switches for over a decade - got away with a 900$m fine. That defect killed at least 124 people.

by _yy 11y ago

General Motors - which knew about their broken ignition switches for over a decade - got away with a 900$m fine. That defect killed at least 124 people.

ams6110 11y ago

And they got bailed out by the US taxpayers. I am just astonished at the outrage over some skirting of an arbitrary number in an emissions standard, in contrast to the comparative yawn over the things other automakers have done that they knew would actually kill people.

lm______ 11y ago
Polluting the environment kills people too.
- kuschku 11y ago
  And CO2 kills also people. VW's cars had far lower CO2 emissions than competitors.
  - Mikeb85 11y ago
    That remains to be seen. CO2 is fairly innocuous, and already makes up a large percent of the volume of air. It's theorized that it leads to climate change (that being said, 8000 years ago Europe was also in an ice age, yet it thawed without mankind's help), but for the present time the amount of deaths that can be directly blamed on CO2 from cars (remember, people and animals create more CO2 than vehicles) is non-existent. Even if mankind's CO2 use does tip the scale enough to definitively kill millions, more CO2 is produced from power plants, ships, industrial ranching and burning forests than is produced by cars (especially VW cars). On the other hand, the other gases released by diesel-burning automobiles do show direct health consequences, and VW has done the most to propagate diesel vehicles...
    - hengheng 11y ago
      > CO2 is fairly innocuous, and already makes up a large percent of the volume of air. 397 ppm, to be exact, or 0.0397%.
    - dragonwriter 11y ago
      > CO2 is fairly innocuous, and already makes up a large percent of the volume of air. Its fairly innocuous at naturally occurring levels, which are not a "large percent" of the air. Nitrogen, Oxygen, and -- if you want to be extremely generous and say that "almost 1%" is "a large percent" -- Argon are the only things that have a remotely plausible case for being a large percent of the atmosphere, and together make up around 99.9%. Carbon dioxide makes up a large percent of the remaining ~0.1%, but...
DanBC 11y ago
Diesel emissions kill tens of thousands of people each year. It's probably hundreds of thousands across Europe. VW's scam has added to those deaths. VW killed far more than 150 people.
- autobahn 11y ago
  [Citation Needed]
  - DanBC 11y ago
    Air pollution kills 60,000 people per year: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/air-pollution-to-blame-for-60000-early-deaths-per-year-government-to-be-warned-9893810.html http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/air-pollution... NO2 kills about 2,600 people each year in London. > The effects of the gas are particularly pronounced in London, where the Greater London Authority already recognises that it prematurely kills 2,600 Londoners each year; http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/car-manufacturers/volkswagen/11899676/The-statistics-about-diesel-are-crystal-clear.-Its-deadly.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/car-manufacturers/volksw... Across Europe this is easily tens of thousands of people and it's easily an order of magnitude over 150.
    - LoSboccacc 11y ago
      NOx emission from road cars is only a percentage of air NOx > like, 34% [1] VW market share is about 20% of that [2] so about 4000 deaths if they polluted their fair share, but since they polluted 20% to 40% more that's about 2000/year additional deaths? numbers are all over the place however, too many uncertainties and unmeasurable factors. also my number doesn't come anywhere close to other estimates[3] [1] http://uk-air.defra.gov.uk/assets/documents/reports/aqeg/nd-summary.pdf http://uk-air.defra.gov.uk/assets/documents/reports/aqeg/nd-... [2] http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/UK-market-share-2014.png http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/... [3] http://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-estimate-the-death-toll-of-the-volkswagen-emissions-cheating-scandal http://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-estimate-the-death-to...
- 11y ago
barkingcat 11y ago
Just because no number of people were killed at present doesn't mean it's not a serious offense.

happyscrappy 11y ago

VW fraud likely killed almost one hundred Americans but far more Europeans. http://www.ibtimes.com/volkswagen-diesel-scandal-2015-emissions-likely-killed-94-people-us-analysis-shows-2125805 http://www.ibtimes.com/volkswagen-diesel-scandal-2015-emissi...

kuschku 11y ago
And probably saved equally many lives, by reducing CO2 per kilometer by almost 20%.

mladenkovacevic 11y ago

I also recall the problems with exploding Firestone tires on specifically Ford vehicles from the early 2000's that probably killed around 250 people and injured thousands. Firestone was fined $500,000 and I can't seem to find a record of Ford being fined anything except settling and losing as well as losing a couple of lawsuits as a result of it.