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I was watching a german program on the VW scandal and was surprised to learn that the German government allowed VW to issue a software patch to correct the prob

I was watching a german program on the VW scandal and was surprised to learn that the German government allowed VW to issue a software patch to correct the problem instead of offering to repair or compensate owners for the cars they purchased. Even with the software patch the vehicles still released emissions that were well above the norm. Also, I don't believe any VW executives have ever been charged in Germany.

pm90 9y ago
Are the emission standards in the US equivalent to those in Germany? From what I recall, the US has tougher standards. Granted, the cars will still be polluting, but they aren't technically illegal; in the US they are illegal to use.
- bitmapbrother 9y ago
  The new US EPA laws do have higher standards but they only went into effect for the 2016 model year when the EPA adopted the California standards. So cars not registered in California and before the 2016 model year aren't held to the California standard unless these states adopted the California standard before the 2016 model year.
- Reason077 9y ago
  The EU does have fairly strict "limits" for NOx emissions from diesel vehicles. The affected VW models, along with many other diesel vehicles, are known to far exceed these limits in real-world driving. However, legally the cars are only required to meet emissions limits in test conditions, and the rules allow for emissions control devices to be disabled if necessary "to protect the engine". So it's not clear if any laws were broken by Volkswagen's use of a defeat device. If there are to be any successful lawsuits against VW over the emissions scandal in the EU, they will likely relate to consumer law - i.e. that VW's cars were deceptively sold as being clean when they were not, and people's vehicles lost value due to VW's actions when the emissions problems became known.
alkonaut 9y ago
I was also very curious how they managed to get my '09 "fixed" somehow via a simple software patch. I would have understood it if it had lost 20% performance or got 20% higher fuel consumption - but that didn't happen. So: if it was that easy to fix legally why did they cheat in the first place?? Of course it can't be that easy. So of course my car is still polluting over the limit. And I think this is a story that isn't getting the coverage it needs. A proper fix for my car would have been to install an AdBlue system into it, at great cost. Had they been forced to do that - or buy back the car - they would be in serious financial trouble. That also answers why the German government is giving them some leeway here: it's not exactly in their interest to kill Volkswagen.
- bluGill 9y ago
  There are a lot of different parameters they can change, but the main ones are turbo boost and injection time. It is easy to find one set of values for each power output request that will make the engine run. Now you optimize. The combinations that is over the limits might not be that different than the values that is over the limits, so it is just a matter of trying them all to see what happens. This is done as an educated guess and refinement: we don't know exactly what any gives set will produce, but we have a good guess.
- dom0 9y ago
  > That also answers why the German government is giving them some leeway here: it's not exactly in their interest to kill Volkswagen. While the federal government does not have a direct stake (apart from all the tax euros), the fine state of Lower Saxony holds a 20 % share (which actually causes the MP and his economics minister to always be on the board of directors).
  - alkonaut 9y ago
    The country has a huge stake regardless since they likely pay unemployment benefits if they were to go under etc.
  - justinclift 9y ago
    Interesting. Does that mean they could have been aware of the problem (from being on the board), before it became public knowledge?
ahartmetz 9y ago
No Microsoft or Intel executives have been charged for grossly anticompetitive practices either. In my mind it is very simple: no country hurts its own industry too much. Effectively, other countries need to step in.

pm90 9y ago

Are the emission standards in the US equivalent to those in Germany? From what I recall, the US has tougher standards. Granted, the cars will still be polluting, but they aren't technically illegal; in the US they are illegal to use.

bitmapbrother 9y ago
The new US EPA laws do have higher standards but they only went into effect for the 2016 model year when the EPA adopted the California standards. So cars not registered in California and before the 2016 model year aren't held to the California standard unless these states adopted the California standard before the 2016 model year.
Reason077 9y ago
The EU does have fairly strict "limits" for NOx emissions from diesel vehicles. The affected VW models, along with many other diesel vehicles, are known to far exceed these limits in real-world driving. However, legally the cars are only required to meet emissions limits in test conditions, and the rules allow for emissions control devices to be disabled if necessary "to protect the engine". So it's not clear if any laws were broken by Volkswagen's use of a defeat device. If there are to be any successful lawsuits against VW over the emissions scandal in the EU, they will likely relate to consumer law - i.e. that VW's cars were deceptively sold as being clean when they were not, and people's vehicles lost value due to VW's actions when the emissions problems became known.

alkonaut 9y ago

I was also very curious how they managed to get my '09 "fixed" somehow via a simple software patch. I would have understood it if it had lost 20% performance or got 20% higher fuel consumption - but that didn't happen. So: if it was that easy to fix legally why did they cheat in the first place?? Of course it can't be that easy. So of course my car is still polluting over the limit. And I think this is a story that isn't getting the coverage it needs. A proper fix for my car would have been to install an AdBlue system into it, at great cost. Had they been forced to do that - or buy back the car - they would be in serious financial trouble. That also answers why the German government is giving them some leeway here: it's not exactly in their interest to kill Volkswagen.

bluGill 9y ago
There are a lot of different parameters they can change, but the main ones are turbo boost and injection time. It is easy to find one set of values for each power output request that will make the engine run. Now you optimize. The combinations that is over the limits might not be that different than the values that is over the limits, so it is just a matter of trying them all to see what happens. This is done as an educated guess and refinement: we don't know exactly what any gives set will produce, but we have a good guess.
dom0 9y ago
> That also answers why the German government is giving them some leeway here: it's not exactly in their interest to kill Volkswagen. While the federal government does not have a direct stake (apart from all the tax euros), the fine state of Lower Saxony holds a 20 % share (which actually causes the MP and his economics minister to always be on the board of directors).
- alkonaut 9y ago
  The country has a huge stake regardless since they likely pay unemployment benefits if they were to go under etc.
- justinclift 9y ago
  Interesting. Does that mean they could have been aware of the problem (from being on the board), before it became public knowledge?

ahartmetz 9y ago

No Microsoft or Intel executives have been charged for grossly anticompetitive practices either. In my mind it is very simple: no country hurts its own industry too much. Effectively, other countries need to step in.