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EPA & Volkswagen 20

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VE1BLL - That would be a very logical approach so you know it'd never happen.

I could buy into the story that it was initially done as a stop-gap measure until more R&D time was spent improving the tech, but just barely. It more likely they were invested in the tech, it wasn't working and they wanted to get the engine to market so they cheated possibly expecting to replace the engine with a new generation of controls in 5 or so years.

I can't buy that upper management didn't know or understand what was done.
 
I think Lionel's speculation must be close to correct. But, it's hard to accept that they would have expected at the outset to get away with this for as long as 5 years. However, once they started down this road they were completely reliant on finding a technical solution that would allow them to do a recall, make whatever mods and make the cheat software disappear. Failing that they would be faced with doing the right thing, replace power trains or BUY BACK at least the 1/2 million vehicles in the US and possibly some or all of the worldwide fleet, or wait to be caught. Somebody must have convinced management that a technical solution would be forthcoming in a reasonable time. It didn't come.

Remember when Intel had to replace Pentium chips? They tried to get out of it.
 
Hey 140, we don't know what else they're getting away with. Maybe more than enough to lend credibility to the test thing.
 
"Remember when Intel had to replace Pentium chips?"

Yes, and what %age of chips ever got replaced? That is hilarious.

Cheers

Greg Locock


New here? Try reading these, they might help FAQ731-376
 
As the Green Car Congress link shows, the 2015 cars at least were SCR; not LNT.

It seems to me that the most likely strategy that VW used in the non-cert test calibration was simply advancing the injection timing along with perhaps cutting back on the urea dosing rate on the SCR cars, and the rich transitions (additional fuel dosing) on the LNT cars. This will have had the effect of improving the performance and the fuel efficiency, minimizing the CO2 and the Pm, so reducing the fuel (if used) for DPF regenerations, and increasing the NOx. Thus, all those aggrieved holier-than-thou owners who want VW to buy their cars back, or at least get a pay-out from some class action law suit need to recognize that they have already had a payout from VW in lower fuel purchases plus they can feel good that they have been "spewing" [don't you love that word!] less CO2 into the atmosphere than would be the case with the legal calibration, and so doing their bit to mitigate climate change.

Perhaps the fuel companies will sue VW for lost fuel sales? But I don't think so.

Why did VW do this? The engineering oriented "interim bodge" advanced earlier is a remote possibility, but whatever it was, it may have been aided & abetted by the Marketing Department who felt the traditional position of diesel as "fuel economy champion" under threat from the improving SI cars and more particularly the HEV cars. If they didn't have fuel economy to crow about, what could they fall back on? I know - let's put some pressure on our engineers to make sure we keep the crown!

PJGD
 
The Pentium was at least a pure error; there was no initial malfeasance. And it was a very minor error, that 99.99% of users would never see nor experience that error in their lifetimes.

TTFN
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!
homework forum: //faq731-376 forum1529
 
So here's a question for anyone that feels these VW cars producing NOx emissions in excess of EPA standards is a horrible crime against humanity deserving a penalty of tens-of-billions of dollars. Why does the US EPA classify electric cars as "zero emissions" when it is obvious that the generation of the electricity used to recharge their batteries typically produces significant amounts of NOx, CO2, CO, SO2, etc? And why are these powerplant emissions resulting from generation of electricity used to operate an EV any less of a hazard to public health than the exact same emissions coming out the tailpipe of a VW diesel automobile?
 
Oh, come on, that's easy. Smog in the LA basin vs. smog in the Grand Canyon. I live in LA, so...

Besides that, power plants have both cap and trade as well as smog control limits that are reasonably stringent, given what they use as fuel.

TTFN
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!
homework forum: //faq731-376 forum1529
 
Note that there are no longer any coal-fired electrical generating plants left in California. We are now 100% coal-free.

Also note that over 20% of the electricity consumed in the state is now coming from renewable sources and by 2020, that number could reach 1/3.

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Engineering Software
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Digital Factory
Cypress, CA
Siemens PLM:
UG/NX Museum:

To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.
 
Do people really think that smog wasn't an issue in LA? Or that it magically pretty much stopped all by itself? Bizarre.

Despite the moaning, forcing the auto industry to go to EFI has been an excellent move in retrospect, for almost everyone. Mind you I had one of the last carburetted Toyotas, air pump and all, ooh that was a nasty looking (and not in a good way) engine.

Cheers

Greg Locock


New here? Try reading these, they might help FAQ731-376
 
"We are now 100% coal-free."

That's because we've outsourced all of that. Given that 20% consumed is from renewable, that leaves 80% as not renewable, of which, 54% involve burning something. Note that 1/4 of the renewable sources also involve burning something. Net is that 60% of the DWP's power comes from burning stuff.

TTFN
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!
homework forum: //faq731-376 forum1529
 
"We are now 100% coal-free."

There hasn't been a coal-fired power plant in California for quite a long time. But the state now imports power from coal-fired plants in other states, which makes everything OK.

And of course California lost over 2GW of carbon-free generating capacity when SONGS was shut down.
 
"crime against humanity"?

I'm not aware of any global issues of NOx and CO production. They are very bad locally, for the people that live near the sources (e.g. urban areas and areas with heavy through-traffic). But I'm not convinced that Mother Earth suffers.

Our wonderful media have got themselves confused by using one word "emissions" for all the gases that come from a prime mover. No regard for which gases are responsible for which effects: some local, some global, some transient, some long-lived.

Water is a big emission from every contemporary fuel other than coal. Maybe if water becomes another "emission", we will see low-water fuels making a comeback?

Steve
 
That's why VW's fine + costs money should be redirected to most effective use, which almost certainly means ignoring these cars and using VW's billions elsewhere. Should be aimed at NOx or similar air pollution in the same regions. It's likely fairly easy to be about a couple orders of magnitude more effective by using the money wisely.
 
Dgallup said:
I've seen several reports that VW was saving about $400 per car by not having urea injection & the proper catalysts and that other automobile manufactures could not figure out how they could both pass emissions and get great performance & fuel economy with the hardware they were using.
Click to expand...

I'm not in the automotive industry so I'm not sure how it normally works, but, based on what you are saying, what surprises me is none of the other auto manufacturers caught on to the issue earlier.

I had always assumed you guys would be purchasing each others products and doing tear downs/performance tests etc. If someone had a car getting inexplicably superior X/Y/Z with lower cost, wouldn't that trigger the competitors to investigate?
 
"I'm not in the automotive industry so I'm not sure how it normally works, but, based on what you are saying, what surprises me is none of the other auto manufacturers caught on to the issue earlier."

I suspect some of them may have known. In fact, how did the EPA find out? Ratted out?
They would have seen the good test data and also the road performance that didn't fit the EPA test modes and might not have known how it was being done. Finding a software cheat is not necessarily easy. VW could have hidden it very well. It might have taken an insider to expose. That could be the reason the EPA took so long to make the accusations.
 
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