6 ms·

I just wish one government would say to VW - 'sorry folks, those cars do not meet emission standards, they are destroying the health of the general public to an

I just wish one government would say to VW - 'sorry folks, those cars do not meet emission standards, they are destroying the health of the general public to an extent that our health services do not want so please take those cars off the road today.' Thereafter the police being instructed to stop any offending VW found on the roads and tow it to the yard, to be released once VW fixed it, with yard storage charges applied at market rates for the locality. The police have automatic number plate recognition, this talks to the licensing authority and a few lines of code could be added to flag up the emission-spewing diesels. Simple. This would also be an experiment in air quality. If overnight a sizeable percentage of cars were no longer on the roads, would there be a noticeable increase in air quality? This would also be handled by market forces, I am sure my VW driving friends would sort out alternative rides or find garages that could add some fancy exhaust pipe that makes them compliant. Draconian? It depends on whether air quality matters or not. That is a fairly black and white thing - either it matters or it doesn't. The 'rule breaking' culture in VW is all very interesting but neither VW or our elected governments have done a thing to take those polluting machines off the road until they are fixed. It is this culture of complacency that bothers me more because it is happening now. The 'rule breaking' culture continues. You would not breathe diesel fumes if you could see them.

Alex3917 11y ago
> If overnight a sizeable percentage of cars were no longer on the roads, would there be a noticeable increase in air quality? We've already done this experiment a number of times. C.f. the hospitalization rates during the Atlanta Olympics.
theli0nheart 11y ago
Unfortunately, such a draconian rule would hurt the owners of the cars more than VW. It would essentially force every car buyer to buy a new car. Plus, there are plenty of cars on the road built before 2000 that have even worse emissions than these VWs. Would you propose taking those cars off the road as well?
- scott_karana 11y ago
  Well, the potential EPA fine per-car is $37,500. An amazing move would be for the EPA to force the cars off the road, and force VW to pay for the affected customers' new cars.
  - sliverstorm 11y ago
    Or the EPA could force VW to release an update for the affected cars' ECU, and avoid sending a million perfectly serviceable cars to the landfill. Which, I believe, is what is supposed to happen.
    - eropple 11y ago
      Any such update will be effectively optional, though, won't it? (I don't know, I don't own a car anymore and the last one I had used an ECU probably dumber than today's toasters.)
      - bri3d 11y ago
        States with state inspection could plausibly require proof of some form that the update has been applied. States which use OBD-II diagnostics should generally already be capable of doing this by reading the CALID supplied by the ECU (it's part of the standard), so they could work off of that.
        sliverstorm 11y ago
        Hell, if we're lucky maybe the testing center can flash the update themselves right there on the test rig over OBD-II if the car doesn't have it. Would save everyone- the State, the consumer, even VW, a lot of heartache in handling a mandatory update.
        ams6110 11y ago
        Or a nice market for VW diesels might develop in non-inspecting states.
BurningFrog 11y ago
> It depends on whether air quality matters or not. That is a fairly black and white thing - either it matters or it doesn't. If you really mean that you should only accept zero emission vehicles.
- ptaipale 11y ago
  Even that is not enough. The vehicle itself may emit zero, but just moving on the roads with wheels on the ground will produce emissions, as tyres grind particles out of the road and turbulence lifts dust up in the air. Emissions very definitely is not a black-and-white thing.
vonmoltke 11y ago
> Draconian? It depends on whether air quality matters or not. That is a fairly black and white thing - either it matters or it doesn't. Nothing measured on an analog scale is black and white. Something is not "safe" or "dangerous" just because it is on one side or another of a semi-arbitrary limit.
sliverstorm 11y ago
That sounds a lot like punishing the consumer for being duped by VW. On the bright side, VW is a very small portion of the market, and I suspect the cheating cars are not much worse than older cars that we allow on the road, which are held to less stringent standards. So while it's completely unacceptable behavior of VW, it's also not the end of the world if people keep driving them until VW issues the software update.
- Swizec 11y ago
  > On the bright side, VW is a very small portion of the market In the US. In Europe Volkswagen accounts for 25% of new car registrations. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-11-17/volkswagen-europe-market-share-shrinks-in-first-month-of-scandal http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-11-17/volkswagen...
  - ams6110 11y ago
    They weren't violating European NOx standards.
    - Eldarrion 11y ago
      According to the article they were. They are implementing a fix for European cars because European standards are a bit more lax than the US ones but they still were violating European standards as well. That said why does it make a difference? If anything, any manufacturer should be doing their best to reduce emissions as much as possible for the sake of the whole world. Just look at the situation currently happening in China. Would you like for your country to be having the same issue, be it France, Germany or the US?
- mrob 11y ago
  We already "punish" people who are duped into buying stolen property (by confiscation of that property), so why should people duped by other illegal activity be treated differently?
  - 11y ago
awjr 11y ago
Let's be clear, every manufacturer was playing this "game". Yes VW played it harder than most and got caught out. The reality is there is no petrol/diesel manufacturer that has been found to be playing it absolutely down the middle.
- ssmoot 11y ago
  When it comes to diesel emissions in the US, I think that's unfair. How many other diesel vehicles are sold in the US that do not include urea injection? Even "3/4" and "1-ton" trucks required it starting 5 years ago. Every other manufacturer I can think of used it. Including VW in some models. I think VW may be the only manufacturer that sold diesels in the US, after 2010, that didn't include it. (Again, I'm not 100% on that.) In light of that, while this may be a game "everyone" plays, it seems like VW was playing on a whole other level.
ahupp 11y ago
"It depends on whether air quality matters or not. That is a fairly black and white thing" On the contrary, I don't think it could be less of a "black or white thing". It sounds like you're making an argument that these cars are producing a material increase in overall NOx, causing a public health hazard. I haven't seen that argument anywhere else. Do you have data on what the net increase in NOx is? .1%, 1% and 100% would mean very different things.
- Eric_WVGG 11y ago
  I’ve read conflicting arguments (which range from pretty bad to incredibly bad)… The Guardian estimates 230-950 thousand tons of NOx per year for seven years, “equivalent to the emissions of all power stations, vehicles, industry, and agriculture in the United Kingdom over a one-year period.” Not a percentage, which would be more useful, but even the lowball estimates indicate a measurable change in pollution levels. http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/sep/22/vw-scandal-caused-nearly-1m-tonnes-of-extra-pollution-analysis-shows http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/sep/22/vw-scandal-c...
Shivetya 11y ago
I am more willing to have the market punish VW long term, the owners of said cars already have suffered because of VWs actions but beyond any step the government can do public opinion has already shifted against VW and Audi. If any punishment were to meted out I would assign a value similar to how insurance companies must when a vehicle is less than a year old is involved. There are loss of value rules already in place. Use those. As for noticeable changes in pollution, that is laughable. You already see more significant changes to pollution just by the school year ending and all those buses being off road. Let alone in winter pollution goes up as more cars run rich to maintain operating temperatures. We should not use government to punish innocent buyers. Government should be used to protect them
balls187 11y ago
How would you implement this? How does a police officer know which car is an offending VW or not? Where does it end? Vehicles that were build prior to tougher emission standards? What about gas engines that are just inefficient, like lawn mowers? The police just don't have the resources to make these type of nuances decisions. Note: I own a 2016 VW Golf R, and a 2003 Golf GTI.

Alex3917 11y ago

> If overnight a sizeable percentage of cars were no longer on the roads, would there be a noticeable increase in air quality? We've already done this experiment a number of times. C.f. the hospitalization rates during the Atlanta Olympics.

theli0nheart 11y ago

Unfortunately, such a draconian rule would hurt the owners of the cars more than VW. It would essentially force every car buyer to buy a new car. Plus, there are plenty of cars on the road built before 2000 that have even worse emissions than these VWs. Would you propose taking those cars off the road as well?

scott_karana 11y ago
Well, the potential EPA fine per-car is $37,500. An amazing move would be for the EPA to force the cars off the road, and force VW to pay for the affected customers' new cars.
- sliverstorm 11y ago
  Or the EPA could force VW to release an update for the affected cars' ECU, and avoid sending a million perfectly serviceable cars to the landfill. Which, I believe, is what is supposed to happen.
  - eropple 11y ago
    Any such update will be effectively optional, though, won't it? (I don't know, I don't own a car anymore and the last one I had used an ECU probably dumber than today's toasters.)
    - bri3d 11y ago
      States with state inspection could plausibly require proof of some form that the update has been applied. States which use OBD-II diagnostics should generally already be capable of doing this by reading the CALID supplied by the ECU (it's part of the standard), so they could work off of that.
      - sliverstorm 11y ago
        Hell, if we're lucky maybe the testing center can flash the update themselves right there on the test rig over OBD-II if the car doesn't have it. Would save everyone- the State, the consumer, even VW, a lot of heartache in handling a mandatory update.
      - ams6110 11y ago
        Or a nice market for VW diesels might develop in non-inspecting states.

BurningFrog 11y ago

> It depends on whether air quality matters or not. That is a fairly black and white thing - either it matters or it doesn't. If you really mean that you should only accept zero emission vehicles.

ptaipale 11y ago
Even that is not enough. The vehicle itself may emit zero, but just moving on the roads with wheels on the ground will produce emissions, as tyres grind particles out of the road and turbulence lifts dust up in the air. Emissions very definitely is not a black-and-white thing.

vonmoltke 11y ago

> Draconian? It depends on whether air quality matters or not. That is a fairly black and white thing - either it matters or it doesn't. Nothing measured on an analog scale is black and white. Something is not "safe" or "dangerous" just because it is on one side or another of a semi-arbitrary limit.

sliverstorm 11y ago

That sounds a lot like punishing the consumer for being duped by VW. On the bright side, VW is a very small portion of the market, and I suspect the cheating cars are not much worse than older cars that we allow on the road, which are held to less stringent standards. So while it's completely unacceptable behavior of VW, it's also not the end of the world if people keep driving them until VW issues the software update.

Swizec 11y ago
> On the bright side, VW is a very small portion of the market In the US. In Europe Volkswagen accounts for 25% of new car registrations. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-11-17/volkswagen-europe-market-share-shrinks-in-first-month-of-scandal http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-11-17/volkswagen...
- ams6110 11y ago
  They weren't violating European NOx standards.
  - Eldarrion 11y ago
    According to the article they were. They are implementing a fix for European cars because European standards are a bit more lax than the US ones but they still were violating European standards as well. That said why does it make a difference? If anything, any manufacturer should be doing their best to reduce emissions as much as possible for the sake of the whole world. Just look at the situation currently happening in China. Would you like for your country to be having the same issue, be it France, Germany or the US?
mrob 11y ago
We already "punish" people who are duped into buying stolen property (by confiscation of that property), so why should people duped by other illegal activity be treated differently?
- 11y ago

awjr 11y ago

Let's be clear, every manufacturer was playing this "game". Yes VW played it harder than most and got caught out. The reality is there is no petrol/diesel manufacturer that has been found to be playing it absolutely down the middle.

ssmoot 11y ago
When it comes to diesel emissions in the US, I think that's unfair. How many other diesel vehicles are sold in the US that do not include urea injection? Even "3/4" and "1-ton" trucks required it starting 5 years ago. Every other manufacturer I can think of used it. Including VW in some models. I think VW may be the only manufacturer that sold diesels in the US, after 2010, that didn't include it. (Again, I'm not 100% on that.) In light of that, while this may be a game "everyone" plays, it seems like VW was playing on a whole other level.

ahupp 11y ago

"It depends on whether air quality matters or not. That is a fairly black and white thing" On the contrary, I don't think it could be less of a "black or white thing". It sounds like you're making an argument that these cars are producing a material increase in overall NOx, causing a public health hazard. I haven't seen that argument anywhere else. Do you have data on what the net increase in NOx is? .1%, 1% and 100% would mean very different things.

Eric_WVGG 11y ago
I’ve read conflicting arguments (which range from pretty bad to incredibly bad)… The Guardian estimates 230-950 thousand tons of NOx per year for seven years, “equivalent to the emissions of all power stations, vehicles, industry, and agriculture in the United Kingdom over a one-year period.” Not a percentage, which would be more useful, but even the lowball estimates indicate a measurable change in pollution levels. http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/sep/22/vw-scandal-caused-nearly-1m-tonnes-of-extra-pollution-analysis-shows http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/sep/22/vw-scandal-c...

Shivetya 11y ago

I am more willing to have the market punish VW long term, the owners of said cars already have suffered because of VWs actions but beyond any step the government can do public opinion has already shifted against VW and Audi. If any punishment were to meted out I would assign a value similar to how insurance companies must when a vehicle is less than a year old is involved. There are loss of value rules already in place. Use those. As for noticeable changes in pollution, that is laughable. You already see more significant changes to pollution just by the school year ending and all those buses being off road. Let alone in winter pollution goes up as more cars run rich to maintain operating temperatures. We should not use government to punish innocent buyers. Government should be used to protect them

balls187 11y ago

How would you implement this? How does a police officer know which car is an offending VW or not? Where does it end? Vehicles that were build prior to tougher emission standards? What about gas engines that are just inefficient, like lawn mowers? The police just don't have the resources to make these type of nuances decisions. Note: I own a 2016 VW Golf R, and a 2003 Golf GTI.