With the COVID-19 pandemic, one thing we notice is the higher fatality rate for elderly patients, or for those with impaired health, or for those who are smokers. It seems that those with weaker immune systems have a harder time fighting off COVID-19, and therefore are more likely to result…
The Republican party that’s in control of the Federal Government is stuck in Grover Norquist’s paradigm – that he famously wanted to shrink Government to be small enough to drag into the bathroom and drown in a baththub. What a violent fantasy that is! Yesterday the US Environmental Protection Agency…
As we’ve been covering for awhile, the US Environmental Protection Agency has been threatening to yank California’s ability to set its own emissions standards. California and many other states have a long-standing precedent to set emissions standards and other environmental regulations. Under the Trump Administration everything that threatens the fossil…
On Monday, General Motors, Fiat Chrysler and Toyota said they were intervening on the side of the Trump Administration in its fight with California over that states’ right to set its own emissions policy. Since the 1960’s California has set its own emissions policies, and has a specific allowance to…
During a fund-raising trip to California, President Trump issued a series of Tweets announcing the Trump Administration is “revoking California’s Federal Waiver on emissions”. He promised this will decrease car prices, make cars much safer, and increase JOBS for auto-workers. To do this his Administration is flouting over 50 years…
The Trump Administration has broken off negotiations with California over vehicle emission standards and clean air rules. Since before the EPA existed, California has regulated clean air standards, with the California Air Resources Board (CARB) overseeing the process. CARB’s efforts have resulted not only in the rise of electric vehicles,…
In 2012 the Obama Administration achieved a major win, with the full endorsement of the automobile industry, to require tighter fuel efficiency standards. The new CAFE Standards would reduce fuel consumption, reducing air pollution, and saving the US Economy zillions of dollars a year in fuel expenditures. Given the friendliness…
While we try to focus on energy and transportation issues on LongTailPipe, the current USA political climate under the President Trump administration has us nervously watching political news. One issue affecting the project of eliminating fossil fuel consumption is the EPA Administrator, Scott Pruitt. Coming from an oil state (Oklahoma),…
On Sept 18, 2015, the EPA and CARB jointly announced the Volkswagen Group had been caught cheating on emissions tests with its 2.0 liter TDI Diesel cars. The fraud had been perpetrated over a 6 year period during which the cars in question had been lauded as ultra-clean wonder cars.…
In July, the EPA officially opposed proposed copyright rules which would have made it easier for independent researchers to catch Volkswagen’s emissions cheating. Last month, the EPA and CARB accused Volkswagen of cheating on emissions tests by programming VW and Audi 2.0 liter TDI Diesel cars to detect when they’re…
Another open question in the Volkswagen Dieselgate emissions cheating scandal is – Why wasn’t Volkswagen’s fraud caught earlier? We’ve been told the cheating began with VW’s 2009 model year 2.0 Liter TDI Diesel cars, the ones fitted with the EA 189 engine. The cheating was not verified until early September 2015.…
Is the only way Volkswagen can repair its image is to completely erase Diesel engines from its car line-up, and to completely switch to plug-in hybrid and battery electric vehicles? That’s what Robert Llewellyn says in this rant. Why is his opinion important? In addition to being an actor, TV show…
A week ago the automotive world was put into turmoil over news that Volkswagen had, allegedly, committed widespread fraud with their emissions test results. Specific Volkswagen and Audi vehicles were emitting lots more pollution than allowed, while their EPA emissions ratings garnered praise and government subsidies by supposedly being the cleanest Diesel vehicles…
Today, Volkswagen announced the “Dieselgate” scandal – VW’s cheating on emissions ratings – affects at least 11 million Volkswagen cars sold world-wide, and that the company is setting aside 6.5 billion euros, or about $7.3 billion — to cover the cost of fixing the cars to comply with pollution standards and…
VW’s inaccurate emissions tests for 2009-15 TDI Diesel passenger cars was not an “accident”, according to the EPA. It’s not like VW’s engineers misconfigured some testing equipment and accidentally came up with bogus numbers. You might do that one year, like Hyundai/Kia did, but a company like Volkswagen would not…
