Volkswagen's Clean Air Act violations on 2009+ TDIs spark huge recall, investigations

tobianogreg said:

Buy backs coming for LNT's.
http://mobile.breakingviews.com/storypage/story.aspx?id=21230256

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I missed the part in there that says that buybacks are coming. Can you help me find it?

TwinWagons said:

An $80 Billion dollar "fine" for this particular crime is a lot like shooting someone for jaywalking. The Democrats would have placed themselves in the shoes of the shooter.

It's nonsense. Proposing it as a possible outcome is nonsense.

If the fine for this is $80 Billion then what do GM and Takata each owe for their airbag and ignition key cover-ups? $250 Billion?

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You're equating negligence with an intentional act and I think they are looking at Dieselgate as an intentional act ( fraud). NO ONE is alleging that Takata or GM intentionally made improper airbags or ignition switches.

GlennGlenn said:

You're equating negligence with an intentional act and I think they are looking at Dieselgate as an intentional act ( fraud). NO ONE is alleging that Takata or GM intentionally made improper airbags or ignition switches.

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Very good point, thanks

GlennGlenn said:

You're equating negligence with an intentional act and I think they are looking at Dieselgate as an intentional act ( fraud). NO ONE is alleging that Takata or GM intentionally made improper airbags or ignition switches.

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BINGO! That's the key difference here and why VW deserves whatever the DOJ can throw at them...

oilhammer said:

That is NOT what that article says. It merely suggests it, so nothing new there.

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Correct, and I quote and highlight part of Olaf's article on Reuters:


"Yet both precedent and the lawsuit’s content suggest the United States will be tougher. The Department of Justice accuses Volkswagen of four different violations of the Clean Air Act. Most strikingly, VW’s theoretical maximum fine if found guilty has more than quadrupled to $90 billion - almost 125 percent of its market capitalisation.
Moreover, Volkswagen has done little to win the goodwill of U.S. authorities. It admitted wrongdoing in September 2015 only after months of stonewalling. The company still lacks a technical fix to lower toxic emissions of its affected U.S. diesels to pass the country’s more demanding emission regimes and effectively reduce exhaust fumes. And the complaint filed on Jan. 4 also accuses VW of continuing to impede and obstruct its investigations “by material omissions and misleading information” after the September confession.
VW cannot afford to lose more time in the United States. It needs to ditch the ill-fated plan to repair the 580,000 U.S. vehicles. A swift buyback of all these would be far more effective, as it would end the extra air pollution at once. These benefits would by far outweigh the initial costs Evercore ISI analysts see at 5.8 billion euros."


Emphasis added ^^^^



In other words, according to this author, VW is stonewalling and hasn't a clue at this time how to fix this debacle. The sharks are circling now.

romad said:

You must have missed the Animas River incident last August.

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S2000_guy said:

1. The Cuyahoga River hasn't caught fire lately.
2. The air quality in US cities today isn't like Beijing; it was never that bad in the bad old days (good old days to those who oppose the Clean Air Act regulations) but it was bad then and would have gotten worse over the years because of growth.
3. I haven't read of any new incidents that compare with Love Canal or Times Beach recently.
4. Mercury emissions from powerplants has been greatly reduced.
5. Acid rain is not as prevalent as it once was.

But I guess none of these are of any benefit to your or your children.

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No, I'm aware of the facts in that incident. A contractor hired by the EPA to clean up an abandoned mine site that was slowly polluting that river screwed up. It will be investigated to determine if there was negligence.

But let's assume that you're right and one mistake should mean an organization has no value whatsoever. Then apply that standard to VW.

SageBrush said:

Very good point, thanks

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nwdiver said:

BINGO! That's the key difference here and why VW deserves whatever the DOJ can throw at them...

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and "intentionally" stonewalling and thumbing your nose doesn't help your cause. Even if "I'm working as fast as I can", its not enough. I think that VW has given them the salute finger once too often and sh^& is hitting the fan as we speak. Meanwhile, innocent owners stand there helplessly and wonder when the bleeding in their value and resalability will stop.

This isn't at all about "negligence" so don't equate GM and Takata etc with VWs intentional issues. VW knew or should have known the consequences of fiddling with the CAA. Its almost a strict liability case, NOTHING to prove here BUT damages now!

romad said:

That is why there is an "ignore" feature here so you can block trolls. So please DFTT (and quoting them is feeding them).

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Looks like I get to use it on three members now. Thank you for the advice romad!

S2000_guy said:

No, I'm aware of the facts in that incident. A contractor hired by the EPA to clean up an abandoned mine site that was polluting that river slowly screwed up. It will be investigated to determine if there was negligence.

But let's assume that you're right and one mistake should mean an organization has no value whatsoever. Then apply that standard to VW.

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@romad and @s2000_guy , @tdipilot4u was pretty clear on the rules of discussing this:

" There is lots of good information in all of the links above. It is highly recommended reading if you want to know the facts.

Moderator note: any user posting political garbage in this thread will immediately receive a one month ban! Keep it clean, keep it factual, and keep it friendly!

The Animas River spill in Colorado is a banned subject; discussing it will get you a one week ban. "

S2000_guy said:

No, I'm aware of the facts in that incident. A contractor hired by the EPA to clean up an abandoned mine site that was slowly polluting that river screwed up. It will be investigated to determine if there was negligence.

But let's assume that you're right and one mistake should mean an organization has no value whatsoever. Then apply that standard to VW.

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LOL... VW wasn't negligence... it was fraud...

Can we all admit that VW isnt stupid, they are actually very smart liars who only care about profit?

SageBrush said:

TW, I understand your reasoning (and agree with it fwiw,) but one big difference here is that the penalty for non-compliance was *already* set before VW cheated. The other big difference is the VW decided to flaunt US law.

It's like the difference between Capone killing someone in Chicago Vs not paying his taxes. The IRS ends up carrying up a much bigger stick. As does the EPA.

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But in this case Al lives in different country and he's partly owned by that other country. If justice tried to hit up VW for $80 Billion, they'd be out of here so fast there'd by a sonic boom!

Justice would be left with no fine money, a bunch of polluting cars that would never be fixed, and several million angry VW, Porsche, and Audi owners to deal with.

nwdiver said:

BINGO! That's the key difference here and why VW deserves whatever the DOJ can throw at them...

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Wow......the post above was the 15,000th post and still going strong

http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN0UJ1N020160105?feedType=RSS&feedName=businessNews


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GlennGlenn,

Enough said. Thanks for the warning.

GlennGlenn said:

NO ONE is alleging that Takata or GM intentionally made improper airbags or ignition switches.

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But BOTH of them INTENTIONALLY hid the defect when it became known to them in order to save money. BTW, at part of the time that GM was hiding the defect, it was managed by the US government. So the US DOJ needs to sue the US Government if they want to be fair.

GM & Tanaka lied, people died.
VW lied, nobody died.

GlennGlenn said:

In the meantime, the value of your TDI drops, the damages increase and your gasser becomes more valuable....

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That is, if you intend on selling your TDI anytime soon. I don't currently plan on selling ANY of my 3 cars, although I wouldn't mind selling my tractor to buy a late 60s or early 70s diesel tractor.

oilhammer said:

There is NO way an 11 year old Corolla is going UP in value.

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True. I really think the value proposition only makes a difference to those who are looking to get out of their VW. I already knew mine would lose value from some tears on the underside of the rear seats, German Shepherd hair on the carpet, remnants of alfalfa and grain, and some random goat feces that that shopvac didn't clean up. My TDI is very useful in my line of work and as such, gets wear and tear. Moreover, if it suits my purpose now, why would I want to get rid of a working solution?

NAZ TDI said:

Ban and destroy every car, truck, motorcycle, lawnmower, chainsaw, boat, ship, and every gasoline, Diesel, propane and natural gas engine. Then expel every resident of every city and put them on a plot of land with a hoe and a spade to grow their own food. Allow only muscle power (human or animal) to be used for transportation.
And make the L.A. basin off limits to everyone. This area had bad air quality even back when only a few Native tribes lived there!

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Ha, I concur. Not to mention the irony that a lot of Angelinos think that going electric will solve problems - not all electric comes from renewable sources; most of LA's power still comes from coal, just burned in other states. And the last I remember, manufacture of everyday products isn't always made with 100% renewable processes.

kjclow said:

I found this paragraph from you link interesting:
The 98 percent drop in VOCs in the last 50 years does not mean that ozone levels have dropped that steeply; the air chemistry that leads from VOCs to ozone is more complex than that. Ozone pollution in the Los Angeles Basin has decreased since the 1960s, but levels still don’t meet ozone standards set by the Environmental Protection Agency.

Couple of thing before I get on my industry soapbox:
This article specificially mentions testing on VOC and that ozone reduction did not drop as dramatically Not all things that create ozone are VOC. To be a Volatil Organic Compound (VOC), the material must contain carbon. The whole diesel emission scandel is around a non-VOC chemical family, NOx.

Soapbox rant:
There have been many other emission regulations implemented in the LA basin over that 50 years that have contributed to this drop. While the largest percentage of emissions still come from cars, the largest reduction in VOC content has been in consumer products. In many cases, the VOC reduction has been greater than 95% over the last 30 years. There are some products for sale today that could be marketed as zero VOC but, since there is no equipment that can accurately determine zero, the FTC won't allow that claim.

And you're right, I do not live in the LA basin. I do however call on manufacturers that both produce and sell consumer chemicals in that area and all of North America.

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It's nice to finally have someone more knowledgeable comment on this issue, rather than those who throw charts and graphs around acting as if they work in the industry (and clearly don't).

WolfsburgGolfTDI said:

IMHO I highly doubt they will pull out of the North American market given they have invested millions into the Chattanooga Passat assembly plant...

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More like billions, which means a pullout of the NA market would be foolish.

TwinWagons said:

You weren't emitting as much material as a passenger bus.

The same process that results in higher N0x emissions in modern diesel engines (lean high temperature combustion) causes them to be near zero emitters of VOCs / Hydrocarbons. Diesel's low volatility means that less of the fuel enters the atmosphere from leaks and spills. Gasoline engines, on the other hand, attempt to maintain a perfect stoichiometric mixture, but are nearly always slightly to significantly outside of stoichiometric. When too lean, they emit N0x, when too rich they emit hydrocarbons / VOCs. Since they don't have particulate filters like modern diesels, they emit particulates. Diesel's higher thermodynamic efficiency moderately reduces their emission of C02 relative to gasoline engines, ceteris paribus.

Total emissions of an automobile are a set of compounds and difficult to characterize with a single number. Comparing engines using different fuels such as gasoline vs. diesel requires that that the lifecycle emissions of the fuel be taken into consideration. Gasoline is a volatile liquid that has a high vapor pressure at ambient temperatures. Throughout the distillation and distribution process for gasoline, cancer causing Volatile Organic Compounds are released.

It's curious that fleet averages that consider several scenarios are used for fuel economy but emissions are instead per compound type, per vehicle. Were the total emissions of these vehicles what was being considered, instead of a particular subset of compounds emitted by vehicles, they'd show their advantages as well their issues.

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Yup, I remember seeing this on a undergrad course I took several years ago on internal combustion engines at my university. The class ended up being a bit too advanced for me (being I'm not a physics major), but the stoichiometric stuff was interesting, seeing what you ended up with depending on a lean or rich mixture.

kjclow said:

No, the gen 1 models were still being sold through 2015, but let's follow the thought treand that all gen 1 models will be subjected to a buy out. Someone postulated earlier that a buy out would be purchase price minus 20 cents per mile (IIRC). For me that would be roughly $26,000 - (86,000*.2)=$8800 for my JSW. The Golf would net out at about $16,500. Add in a 10% penalty and I come up with about $28,000 for two cars. I could afford to replace one car and I guess the other one of us has to ride a bike. Both of these cars are paid off and I would rather pay off my daughters' weddings than a new unplanned car payment.

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Yup, I remember getting some BS dealer buyback offers "to fulfill needs for 2010 model vehicles for interested buyers." I though it was funny that I would theoretically owe money back - $28000 - (152,000*.2=30,400) = -2400. I guess it didn't work out in my favor that I dropped over 40,000 miles on my TDI last year, and that doesn't include mileage on rentals or my other vehicles, putting me well over 50K for the whole year!

Jeta Life said:

What gets me lately on this forum are the anti-VW trolls like the one who's name looks like Lucifer.
If they are disgruntled just go buy a Prius or a Leaf and join a Toyot or Nissan forum.
Then there are those who make it seem like we are killing everyone with our NOX. Folks do you realize that diesels comprise about only 1% of cars while gassers about 95% I would guess with about 1-2 % EVs.
Do these people really think us 1% diesel owners are killing everyone with our NOX. Please, stop the nonsense or just go and torture some other souls on another forum.

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Or other names whom I won't mention, since I don't want to keep feeding the trolls, although our replies seem to do that anyways. But it would be no fun on a Prius or Leaf forum for them - what's the fun if everyone agrees with you 100%?

romad said:

But they DO do something to you, so BOHICA! Oh, also CARB is mainly there to make themselves rich, again by doing things TO you.

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Yup - like darn near all Commiefornia agencies.

tobianogreg said:

Buy backs coming for LNT's.

http://mobile.breakingviews.com/storypage/story.aspx?id=21230256

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This looks more like an opinion piece. Never ceases to amaze me how people take opinion pieces as fact.

dpospres said:

Wow......the post above was the 15,000th post and still going strong

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Wouldn't be surprised if it reached 50,000 before this debacle ends.

romad said:

But BOTH of them INTENTIONALLY hid the defect when it became known to them in order to save money. BTW, at part of the time that GM was hiding the defect, it was managed by the US government. So the US DOJ needs to sue the US Government if they want to be fair.

GM & Tanaka lied, people died.
VW lied, nobody died.

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Statistically the VW cheat did kill people. NOx kills. Arguing that NOx doesn't cause deaths is no different than arguing that smoking is harmless... it's absurd. The coverup may have been intentional but GM and Takata didn't design the airbags to shoot shrapnel like VW designed their engines to cheat on emissions tests.

GlennGlenn said:

@romad and @s2000_guy , @tdipilot4u was pretty clear on the rules of discussing this:

" There is lots of good information in all of the links above. It is highly recommended reading if you want to know the facts.

Moderator note: any user posting political garbage in this thread will immediately receive a one month ban! Keep it clean, keep it factual, and keep it friendly!

The Animas River spill in Colorado is a banned subject; discussing it will get you a one week ban. "

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Thanks, Glenn; Haven't read that post since 9 Sep 15. It must have been added later. This thread is so long I just read the latest posts as I'm notified of them by the board software plus I had to set it to display 100 posts per page!

GlennGlenn said:

Correct, and I quote and highlight part of Olaf's article on Reuters:
The company still lacks a technical fix to lower toxic emissions of its affected U.S. diesels to pass the country’s more demanding emission regimes and effectively reduce exhaust fumes. And the complaint filed on Jan. 4 also accuses VW of continuing to impede and obstruct its investigations “by material omissions and misleading information” after the September confession.
VW cannot afford to lose more time in the United States. It needs to ditch the ill-fated plan to repair the 580,000 U.S. vehicles. A swift buyback of all these would be far more effective, as it would end the extra air pollution at once. These benefits would by far outweigh the initial costs Evercore ISI analysts see at 5.8 billion euros."


Emphasis added ^^^^



In other words, according to this author, VW is stonewalling and hasn't a clue at this time how to fix this debacle. The sharks are circling now.

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At this point, EPA and CARB have the ball in their court. VW lacks an approved technical fix. They turned one in to CARB & EPA, who are still mulling it over. Emphasis added...

As the Dude would say, "That's like you're opinion, man."

nwdiver said:

Statistically the VW cheat did kill people. NOx kills. Arguing that NOx doesn't cause deaths is no different than arguing that smoking is harmless... it's absurd. The coverup may have been intentional but GM and Takata didn't design the airbags to shoot shrapnel like VW designed their engines to cheat on emissions tests.

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"Lies, damned lies, and statistics" -- Mark Twain.

nwdiver said:

Statistically the VW cheat did kill people. NOx kills. Arguing that NOx doesn't cause deaths is no different than arguing that smoking is harmless... it's absurd. The coverup may have been intentional but GM and Takata didn't design the airbags to shoot shrapnel like VW designed their engines to cheat on emissions tests.

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Actually based on the number of affected TDIs vs the total number of vehicles in the world, for someone alive now, they would probably have to live for several hundred years before the excess emission from the TDI vehicles would be a factor. I'm more concerned about the emissions from trucks & pickups over 14,000 GVWR.

How I read the article about how the Justice Department is suing VW of A is b/c the fix is too slow.

They are dragging their feet with us the consumers. The EPA wasn't too happy with it and got in with DoJ.

Is this why the CARB needed a few more weeks to approve the tentative VW solution?

Thus, this suit is used for leverage, as a kick in the butt, to get VW moving to settle our compensation for their fraud.

LA times today front page business section.

Seems this government is helping me.

nayr said:

"Lies, damned lies, and statistics" -- Mark Twain.

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So smoking isn't harmful? Stats are the only thing linking tobacco to cancer... lot's of 90 year olds out there with a pack-a-day habit...

I may be jaded but unless you made potfuls of campaign donations, it's not likely this or any government entity has your particular best interest at heart.

I have a lot of respect for MIT as an institution- but that particular statistical analysis is a joke. A Tesla S charged off grid power might easily be shown to be more deadly on a per car basis than the new tdi's under such an analysis. Statistically, McDonalds is far more deadly, and I don't hear too much ranting here about that.

Cow farts are deadly, too. Not gonna stop me from enjoying a big ol' juicy steak now and then, though.

turbobrick240 said:

I have a lot of respect for MIT as an institution- but that particular statistical analysis is a joke. A Tesla S charged off grid power might easily be shown to be more deadly on a per car basis than the new tdi's under such an analysis. Statistically, McDonalds is far more deadly, and I don't hear too much ranting here about that.

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That would be why we're adding >20x more renewable production than new EVs consume every year and why the EPA also has strict emissions standard for power plants.

YOU eating at McDonalds is also unlikely to hurt your neighbor... no such thing as second-hand diabetes.

You're right, VW has invested billions ....
Being able to prove death by NOx is a lot tougher because yes, automobiles are held to a strict emissions standard, but commercial bus and trucks have a different standard. Also, one could argue that it could be caused by other diesel owners that like to roal coal.

But it's still wrong. I'm not sticking up for VW nor am I saying your argument is invaled, what they did was/is wrong, but being able to prove/argue that is another story. They have lost a lot of customers though this whole spiel so how they "fix" this will either bring some of them back or push more away.