
Volkswagen's U.S. diesel emissions settlement to cost $15B - ilyaeck
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-volkswagen-emissions-settlement-idUSKCN0ZD2S5
======
beefman
In the United States, the VW defeat mechanism abates 275,000 tonne/yr CO2 at
the cost of 8,200 tonne/yr NOx.[1][2][3][4][5][6]

[1] NY Times: How Volkswagen Got Away With Diesel Deception
[http://nyti.ms/1ZjAV1w](http://nyti.ms/1ZjAV1w)

[2] Vox: VW's appalling clean diesel scandal, explained
[http://bit.ly/1MhJVuA](http://bit.ly/1MhJVuA)

[3] FHWA: Annual Vehicle Distance Traveled and Related Data
[http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/policyinformation/statistics/2013/vm...](http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/policyinformation/statistics/2013/vm1.cfm)

[4] EIA: How much CO2 is produced by burning gasoline?
[http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=307&t=11](http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=307&t=11)

[5] EPA: Does the fuel used in fuel economy testing contain ethanol?
[http://www3.epa.gov/otaq/about/faq.htm#ethanol](http://www3.epa.gov/otaq/about/faq.htm#ethanol)

[6] DOE: Fuel Economy of 2015 Volkswagen Jetta
[http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/bymodel/2015_Volkswagen_Jetta...](http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/bymodel/2015_Volkswagen_Jetta.shtml)

~~~
williamscales
Interesting. Would you mind elaborating? What are the relative environmental
costs of these pollutants? How did you arrive at the abatement figure? (I
skimmed your links but it didn't leap out at me.)

~~~
beefman
See below for the calculation. The relative environmental costs are debatable
but NOx being 34 times worse is a stretch. Protectionism may be a factor --
domestic automakers have little incentive to push back on NOx.

The response is punitive because VW acted deliberately but otherwise far out
of proportion to the harm. The article mentions that buybacks cannot be resold
unless EPA approves a fix. I hope they do, because their embodied energy will
dwarf by a significant margin everything else being considered here and
scrapping them would be a disaster.

Fortunately internal combustion engines are nearly obsolete for light
automobiles and this will all be moot in a decade.

    
    
      VW light vehicle sales: 50M worldwide since 2009 [1]
      Affected cars: 500,000 US, 11M worldwide [2]
      VLKAY price: 70% pre-scandal level [1]
    
      For the United States...
    
      Annual average miles traveled per car: 11,000 [3]
      NOx emissions allowed: 0.06 g/mi [1]
      Actual TDI emissions: 1.6 g/mi [1]
    
      11,000 mi * 500,000 * 1.5g/mi = 8,200 tonne NOx per year
    
      CO2 from gasoline combustion: 8.9 kg/gal [4][5]
      CO2 from diesel combustion: 10.2 kg/gal [4]
      Jetta fuel efficiency: 27 mpg [6]
      Jetta TDI fuel efficiency: 36 mpg [6]
      Jetta carbon efficiency: 330 g/mi
      Jetta TDI carbon efficiency: 280 g/mi
    
      11,000 mi * 500,000 * -50 g/mi = -275,000 tonne CO2 per year

------
socalnate1
It seems odd to me that most of the financial windfall here goes to Volkswagen
owners. (2/3 anyway). Wasn't the "damage" done almost exclusively
environmental, which affects everyone?

Wouldn't it make more sense to use these large amounts of money to combat the
actual damage that was done? (e.g. environmental cleanup initiatives?)

~~~
supercoder
Because the VW owners were the ones who paid their own money for a product
that was falsely advertised.

Its not like these cars caused direct damage to the environment that can be
cleaned up, they're still relatively low in emissions compared to a lot of
other cars on the road.

~~~
freehunter
Well the VW drivers got to drive a car, so they did get some benefit out of
owning it even if it wasn't exactly as advertised. Meanwhile the rest of us
got to breathe their pollution and die sooner. It's not "they're lower
emissions than other vehicles", it's that they aren't as low emissions as they
said they were. If people were in the market for a LEV and they bought a VW
over a car that _actually_ produced the emissions that the VW claimed to,
that's an insane amount more pollution than the alternative car.

It's not just VW owners who were lied to. It's everyone who had to breathe the
air around them.

~~~
jsz0
> Meanwhile the rest of us got to breathe their pollution and die sooner.

The people who own the cars breathed in the pollution too. Almost certainly
more than people who did not own one.

~~~
freehunter
I'm not sure about that. Pollution comes out of the back of the car, and the
drivers sit well in front of the tail pipe. As long as they're not standing
behind their running car for long periods of time, the person inhaling most of
the exhaust will be the car behind them in traffic or more likely, the
pedestrian standing beside them on the sidewalk at a red light.

------
bluedevil2k
I'm a "proud" owner of a 2014 Passat TDI (purchased May 2014). Here's the math
breakdown for me personally:

\- $26,000 for the car, before TTL \- First year, the car will depreciate 20%,
so its September 2015 value would be $20,800. \- VW will give me $5,100 (maybe
more) plus that Sept 2015 value = $25,900 \- I don't have to make a decision
until December 2018

Result: I get a car for 4.5 years for which I've paid $100

* Simplified math, doesn't factor time-value or the 0.9% interest rate.

~~~
TheCondor
Would you buy another VW, Audi or Porsche?

~~~
duncan_bayne
Why not?

Bear in mind, the vehicles VW sold were _superior_ from the point of view of
the customer & driver.

Unless of course the whole affair dented your faith in them responding
properly to safety issues or the like.

~~~
walrus01
Modern VW might be nice from the perspective of a driver but they are a royal
pain in the ass to service... Designed as throw away appliances almost.

------
gnoway
"Owners will have two years to decide whether to sell back vehicles..."

So the rumor is I can drive my affected Golf TDI for ~2 more years, and then
get compensated @9/2015 value plus up to $5k on top of that? Honestly, that's
a terrible deal for VW.

Edit: thinking more, maybe this is better for VW than an alternative where
they have to make good right away. They don't have to scramble to get 500k
cars repaired or off the road as quickly, and they can spread whatever makes
up the rest of their hit over a longer period as well.

To me, this does signal that we're a lot more upset about the dishonesty than
we are about the emissions themselves.

~~~
adamnemecek
It's punitive, it's supposed to be terrible.

~~~
bpodgursky
Yeah, but I'd prefer the penalties did something useful, and weren't just a
cash transfer to people who got lucky and bought cars from an unethical
manufacturer.

~~~
privong
> just a cash transfer to people who got lucky and bought cars from an
> unethical manufacturer.

They didn't "get lucky". They were lied to by the company and sold a car under
false pretenses.

Edit: I had the fuel economy bit wrong, my mistake. I've removed that portion.
Thanks @mikestew, @gnoway, and @GavinMcG for the correction.

~~~
gnoway
This wasn't exactly a fuel economy issue, it was more of an emissions cheat. I
get great economy out of my Golf - higher than advertised. I agree that if
they'd done the right thing w/ emissions that economy might have been worse
and the car not as attractive.

------
1024core
Where's the jailtime?

As an individual, you make one wrong statement to the FBI, and you are hauled
off to jail. The company lied over 500,000 times to the government, and gets
off by paying a paltry fine. No wonder companies continue to do this: there is
no consequence to the employees who do this shit.

~~~
setpatchaddress
You may wish to search for "Dieselgate" on the web, to better familiarize
yourself with this case.

The German government is actually investigating the ex-VW Germany CEO,
although I don't know if that means potential jail time.

Further, there have been serious consequences at VW. Top management has
effectively changed in both Germany and the US. The future product roadmap has
changed radically in both the US and Europe. Also, this direct monetary outlay
is not exactly a slap on the wrist, even for one of the world's largest
automakers.

~~~
a3camero
Losing your job << going to jail for your actions. From the Wikipedia article:
"... estimated that approximately 59 premature deaths will be caused by the
excess pollution produced between 2008 and 2015 by vehicles equipped with the
defeat device in the U.S."
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_emissions_scandal#D...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_emissions_scandal#Deaths)

Installing the defeat devices in hundreds of thousands of vehicles was not an
accident that happened one day. It was a calculated corporate decision
involving many people, over a long period of time. The result, according to
many sources, was dozens to hundreds of deaths in the United States, Europe
and elsewhere.

~~~
cced
How are deaths related tk falsified fuel emissions calculated?

Edit: a word

~~~
Unklejoe
There's no way they can reliably calculate that. Any increase in deaths could
just as easily be attributed to the increase in popularity of country music
and therefore diesel truck sales. All we can reliably say is that the
environment is worse off.

Also, 59 seems like a statistically insignificant number when compared to the
overall population. Or maybe I'm interpreting it incorrectly?

~~~
ams6110
I sit in stunned amazement at the foaming-at-the-mouth outrage being expressed
on this thread.

There is no way you can pin the death of anybody on VW diesel emissions. It's
a statistics game that that's it. You might as well blame Tesla for the extra
deaths caused by the increase coal plant emissions created by owners charging
their cars. Or make up any other example of any activity that increases some
polutant. The _only_ difference is that VW violated an arbitrary number in a
government regulation.

There are millions of vehicles on the road today with worse emissions than the
violating VW diesels. They are all killing people (statistically) and the
government and therefore you and I are complicit in this murder by allowing it
to continue. I am sure everone on this thread will endorse punitive tax
increases to punish us all for our negligence, and to buy out the owners of
these polluting cars so that they can all buy clean-and-green new ones
(conveniently ignoring the rather massive environmental impact and attendant
premature deaths caused by junking and replacing perfectly serviceable
vehicles).

~~~
Unklejoe
Exactly. It's understandable to be angry about this, but I think many people
overestimate the magnitude of the issue here (or perhaps have misplaced their
anger).

Consider the fact that in some states, heavy duty diesel trucks (8,500 lbs or
more) and trucks older than 1997 are completely exempt from all emissions
testing.

I bet a single one of those trucks produces more emissions than the "actual vs
claimed" emissions delta of dozens of VWs combined.

------
btilly
Compare with [http://www.cnbc.com/2015/10/29/vw-excess-emissions-linked-
to...](http://www.cnbc.com/2015/10/29/vw-excess-emissions-linked-to-60-us-
deaths-study.html).

VWs actions left around 60 estimated dead. Around 120,000 days of people not
being able to function normally. At a direct cost to the economy of around
$450 million. And a cost to our quality of life that most would consider even
higher.

All of which is bad. But no matter how you do the math, most of this fine is
punitive dissuasion for others who might be tempted to also cheat.

(Note that most of the fine moves money from the left hand to the right
without destroying it, so we are theoretically collectively left better off as
a result. Plus we prevent about as much more damage as we had already.)

~~~
gdudeman
I think you're right. Fines have to be higher than the direct cost to society
and they have to be higher by the chance they're caught.

In this case, it was very hard to detect, it was fully intentional on the part
of the company, and they fought for years to keep it hidden.

This sort of deception is maybe 1 in 20 or 1 in 50 to be caught? So it isn't
like a parking ticket - it's hard to catch and was hard to prove.

Furthermore, this is a "deal with the mess you made" solution - or a "natural
consequences" consequence if you are a parent. There are certainly much more
efficient ways of spending the money to improve public health, but those are
abstract, hard to explain to the public, and hard to explain to the car
owners. So they are less efficient from the government, public and company's
perspective. Make America hyper-rational and the owners would continue driving
these cars and we'd spend the money on truck emissions or something.

~~~
BurningFrog
> In this case, it was very hard to detect

Was it? The researches who detected it didn't seem like they were doing
anything that special. My impression is that nobody had bothered to check
before.

------
louprado
On September 22, 2015, VW stock had the trading highest volume / price
decline. The stock closed $106 per share that day.

There is a trading strategy that assumes markets over estimate liability of
lawsuits. While I am probably cherry picking data, it is notable that the
stock closed at exactly $106 per share today. So much for that trading
strategy in this case. The market pretty much nailed it.

~~~
penetrarthur
In my opinion it is going to grow from now on, until it gets back to normal. A
large part of the world is driving cars made by VW Group. Too big to fail.

------
chappi42
Economic war: US vs. Germany. Nothing else.

Nature would benefit if gasoline prices were 10 US per liter and people would
stop to drive around senselessly. (I know the geographic circumstances make
this impossible, but nevertheless...).

~~~
bogomipz
How is defrauding consumers a "US vs Germany issue" and nothing else?

Also VW got off with a slap on the wrist here.

The US did nothing wrong here. People don't drive around needlessly, they
drive because they live in places that often have no viable alternative. Why
on earth should they be punished?

Your comments are bizarre and naive. Is you point just anti-Americanism?

~~~
shaqbert
1- GM, Ford, Chrysler lobby congress to enact the strictest NOX limits in the
world. While at the same time having lenient limits on other exhaust fumes
killing thousands of people every year, so that we can continue our gas
guzzling SUV and Pickup truck craze.

2- VW faced wtih dilemma. Stop selling diesels altogether, or go rogue and
yolo your way through emission tests.

3- Get caught and fined.

Well played, GM, Ford, and Chrysler. GM, Ford, and Chrysler were behind in
Diesel tech, so this as a great defensive move to thwart Japanase and European
automotive competition.

Moral of the story is: You need good lobbyists if you wanna be successful
here.

~~~
shaqbert
In the meantime, some smart scientist notice that the exhaust from fracking is
pretty poisonous and sometimes even radioactive... (lots of fracking wells
release more radioactivity than highly regulated nuclear power plants).

Thank god the big oil lobby massages congress to enact legislation that
naturally bound pollution released through fracking/digging/drilling does not
count.

------
astraelraen
If you discount all the hypothetical environmental costs that at best guess
are just that, guesses. And, if you were to consider this penalty in a
somewhat satirical manner, it would have been cheaper for VW if they would
have been killing the consumers of their cars.

I understand the punitive nature of the penalty and its amount, but the amount
seems somewhat egregious given the fact that all VW did was violate
regulations of a government body. Uber is constantly praised for skirting or
directly violating state or local government laws and regulations, yet is seen
in an overall positive light for the supposed benefit they are providing
society. This is the government's heavy hand making an example of VW and it's
violation of regulation.

~~~
throwawaysocks
_> If you discount all the hypothetical environmental costs that at best guess
are just that, guesses_

That VW's behavior caused some environmental impact is not a guess. The guess
is only to the extent of the damage.

 _> it would have been cheaper for VW if they would have been killing the
consumers of their cars._

That is ridiculous. The death toll would be many times 9/11.

USG would've seized by force every asset inside its borders and a lot (or all)
outside of its borders. Not only of VW but of any contractor that might've may
had something to do with it. For starters.

 _> Uber is constantly praised for skirting or directly violating state or
local government laws_

And also constantly criticized, and sometimes shut down.

But more to the point, violating different government regulations (by
extension, different laws) has different outcomes. Why is that
surprising/concerning, again? Federal environmental regulations _SHOULD_ be
treated more seriously than local taxi rules.

 _> This is the government's heavy hand making an example of VW and it's
violation of regulation._

On only his can we agree. The message is clear: fines for willfully ignoring
environmental regulation are _not_ a cost of business.

------
wallace_f
I'm not following this closely, but I understand most at least 4 other auto
manufacturers were doing essentially the same thing:
[https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/oct/09/mercedes...](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/oct/09/mercedes-
honda-mazda-mitsubishi-diesel-emissions-row)

Why the focus on VW, then, rather on the auto industry?

~~~
MrRadar
VW did something in the US that's explicitly illegal under US federal law
(employ a "defeat device" to disable emissions equipment outside of testing).
For the most part the other auto manufacturers seem to be tuning/optimizing
their emissions equipment specifically to pass the test cycles but are not
going so far as to outright disable it outside of them like VW did.

------
SwellJoe
I'm of the opinion that there should be a corporate death penalty (though I
oppose the death penalty in criminal cases). There's some situations that are
so ethically indefensible, wherein a corporation can cause incredible harm
over a long period of time, that the only just outcome is for the company to
be destroyed. The people responsible are shielded from any real consequence
(how many people at VW knew about this, and how many are going to jail over
it?). This is not a minor squabble over regulations; this is a conscious
decision, involving many executives within the company, to willfully cause
environmental destruction that directly costs human lives and health.

This is one of those cases where the corporate death penalty is the only just
outcome I can think of.

$15 billion looks like a large sum; and maybe it's even enough to deter car
companies from doing something similar in the future. Maybe. VW is worth $73
billion, and they generated a lot of money on the strength of their diesel
campaigns. Amortized over the many years that they were shipping out these
cars, it begins to look like a cost of doing business, rather than a massively
punitive expense.

~~~
ATsch
Such a "Coorporate death penalty" is likely counterproductive in several ways.
On one hand you could just open a new company under a similar name and
continue buisiness as usual, on the the other hand, what happens to the
workers employed by VW? It would kill entire cities in many places of the
world. For example, Wolfsburg, the VW headquarter city has a population of
~100 000, the factory alone employs 57,000 people, ignoring administration and
managment for VW in Wolfsburg. The shareholders would still be richer and
don't have to fear punishment, the managers are still well networked enough to
quickly get a new job at Siemens or wherever and the only people suffering at
the end are the guys putting the seats into the chassis who had nothing to do
with the whole situation.

Also, what you are ignoring is that the US can't just come along and close a
transnational or foreign company. Also, what about subsidaries? Does condé
nast get closed if reddit violates the law? Does GM get closed if Opel cheats?

~~~
freehunter
All of those things have direct comparisons to the individual death penalty or
other pre-existing laws.

A human could be put to death even if they have a family to support, so the
workers argument is settled. The only issue is the matter of scale, but the
death penalty is pretty rare to begin with, and I would expect a corporate
death penalty have even stricter requirements.

They don't have to close a transnational, they can just force them to stop
doing business in the country. They can close their US operations and ban
their imports. We already have import bans on companies, countries, and
products.

For subsidiaries, it would depends on how far up the chain the crime went. If
Opel committed the crime but GM didn't know, Opel dies. If GM knew, GM dies.
You could likely even spin off the "innocent" subsidiaries. If a husband
commits a crime and the wife was not involved, the wife doesn't go to jail. If
they both did it but their children were not involved, the children don't go
to jail, they go to live with another set of parents.

~~~
Scarblac
I feel it's a bit strange to argue for corporate death penalty by comparing it
to individual death penalty, given how controversial the individual death
penalty is.

~~~
freehunter
It should be, they both should be very controversial. But it easier to argue
for a corporate death penalty than it is for a corporate "life in prison"
because both of those things look exactly the same.

------
spriggan3
Does anybody remember when Volkswagen blamed the scandal on "the engineer
culture" or something like that? like those engineers at Volkswagen called the
shot and not the management ... ridiculous , like these engineers weren't
asked to cheat ... I can't wait for the criminal investigation.

~~~
themartorana
I feel like you might have to wait. A long time.

------
dmichulke
For context:

 _GM to Pay Record $35 Million Fine Over Ignition Switch Recalls_ (May 2014)

[http://time.com/102906/gm-fine-ignition-recalls/](http://time.com/102906/gm-
fine-ignition-recalls/)

"The federal government struck a $35 million settlement with General Motors
after the company failed to act for 10 years on an ignition switch defect that
led to the death of at least 13 people and recall of approximately 2.6 million
vehicles"

~~~
vonmoltke
If you want to provide context, try picking an article from after GM admitted
to hiding the extent of the problem:

 _GM will pay $900 million over ignition switch scandal_ (September 2015)

[http://bigstory.ap.org/article/e1207eccc10c4f2a8ef550da95e12...](http://bigstory.ap.org/article/e1207eccc10c4f2a8ef550da95e121c0/gm-
said-settle-criminal-case-over-ignition-switches)

"General Motors agreed to pay $900 million to fend off criminal prosecution
over the deadly ignition-switch scandal, striking a deal that brought
criticism down on the Justice Department for not bringing charges against
individual employees."

"Also Thursday, GM announced it will spend $575 million to settle the majority
of the civil lawsuits filed over the scandal."

"The twin agreements bring to more than $5.3 billion the amount GM has spent
on a problem authorities say could have been handled for less than a dollar
per car."

------
mayneack
Does anyone know what the total paid by BP was for Deepwater Horizon? I can't
seem to find a total anywhere here:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deepwater_Horizon_litigation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deepwater_Horizon_litigation)
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deepwater_Horizon#Aftermath](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deepwater_Horizon#Aftermath)

------
alkonaut
So because they marketed it as "Clean diesel" in the US their 2009 2.0 tdi
owners get $5-10k plus an estimated value of the car as of 2015. Meanwhile in
Europe we get a "fix" that reduces engine power and/or increases fuel
consumption, and while the car has depreciated in value we get no other
compensation, and seem to have no way of winning a class action against VW (Of
course, if we did, we'd could kill VW instantly which I assume is not what any
of the EU member countries want). I'd be perfectly happy with a much smaller
sum or even a rebate on a new car. But no. Nothing.

The low emission 2.0 TDI models (Such as Audi's TDIe) _were_ very much
marketed as very eco friendly, and it meant a lot of corporate buyers with CO2
caps bought it in stiff competition with other cars. If the engines had met
the NOx emissions, the consumption (and thus CO2) would have been higher, and
the cars couldn't have been boughy, or wouldn't have been bought because of
being less attractive with lower power or higher consumption. If this isn't
marketing it as "clean diesel" I don't know what is.

------
patrickg_zill
I am surprised that no one mentioned the other fraudulent actor in this whole
mess: the CARB, California's Air Resources Board.

They are the ones who lied about their diesel engine standards for air
quality. Under the guise of making tough standards they basically outlawed
diesels in California.

Since CA is such a big car market this prevented most manufacturers from
selling any diesel cars anywhere in the USA.

------
reality_czech
VW deserves this. Hopefully this penalty will discourage other automakers from
cheating in this way. It would also be nice if Mr. Winterkorn and the
executives who were complicit in this were prosecuted. I wonder how well they
have covered their tracks.

I am glad to see there will be some money going to the owners of the affected
diesels. A lot of these people bought the cars because they were marketed as
more environmentally friendly. Then, they were left with an embarrassing car
with near-zero resale value once the revelations came out.

I feel like the US has a bizarrely inconsistent attitude towards air
pollution. The standards for NOx emissions for diesel construction equipment
and ships are almost non-existent. If VW's actions are reprehensible, surely
the lawmakers who created such a bizarrely fragmented regulatory regime are
also to blame.
[http://www.greenhoustontx.gov/reports/closingdieseldivide.pd...](http://www.greenhoustontx.gov/reports/closingdieseldivide.pdf)

------
covi
Now's better than ever to buy a new Volkswagen. Because of the scandal, I've
found crazy deals (~30-40% off MSRP) for new VWs.

~~~
homero
Where

------
ProfChronos
I am really amazed by the comments I read so I am voluntarily going to
"defend" VW while I would not in other circumstances. To make sure this is
understood: yes VW is guilty, it has violated customers' trust, they are a
shame for the entire car industry and should receive strong punishment for
that.

Yet, how can everybody forget about all other car manufacturers - especially
US? They pretty much all lie about their gas emissions as proven by different
experts and agencies [1] [2] [3].

Why? Because we have improved our gas emission limits to a level that most car
manufacturers couldn't reach over the short run. Take the example of European
car makers. The European Commission started to really regulate car emissions
in 2010. At that time, car makers were faced with dropping sales (double
crisis 2008 and 2010), stable/slightly increasing costs (wage inflation and
poor labour market flexibility - German is an exception in Europe) and
stable/slightly decreasing prices (due to competition and few new vehicles).
In this context, how can you expect car makers to invest in "traditional cars"
to reduce gas emissions and in electric and autonomous vehicles to fight
against the competition of tech car companies like Tesla or Google. That is
just not possible.

So who is responsible? Of course VW and other car makers are all responsible
for that mess and the disastrous consequences on environment. But WE are also
responsible: we want safer, cleaner, cheaper and stronger vehicles from
traditional car makers but but you can't have everything all at once. Tesla
can do it because that they start from a "blank page", with no turnaround
costs. For VW, GM, Toyota, that's another story. Maybe we should just keep
that in mind before charged them with a "corporate death penalty"...

[1][http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/volkswagen-w...](http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/volkswagen-
wasnt-the-only-company-rigging-emission-levels-says-expert-a6668611.html)
[2][https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/apr/21/all-top-
sel...](https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/apr/21/all-top-selling-cars-
break-emissions-limits-in-real-world-tests)
[3][http://www.cbsnews.com/news/do-all-automakers-cheat-on-
their...](http://www.cbsnews.com/news/do-all-automakers-cheat-on-their-mpg-
tests/)

~~~
grp
Tesla can't do it. Electric vehicles have a lot of _hidden pollution_ like a
meat steak or a bottle of milk.

Tesla just makes cars that can't apply to gas emissions regulations, they are
far from cleaner.

~~~
7952
Surely those toxins are much more containable than gas released into the air?
A mobile phone is also horribly toxic, but I am not going to go onto the top
of a skyscraper and blend it into tiny particles for the people below to
breathe.

------
ourmandave
The report this morning said the government gets $5b for environmental clean
up and customers get $10b in fixes or buy backs.

We'll see.

There was a GM settlement like this (the pickup gas tank problem) and
customers with existing pickups got a coupon good for $1000 off the price of a
new pickup. So GM gets to sell you a new pickup and probably keeps any rebates
or low financing.

Also the recent Ticket Master settlement for $420M. There's a daily allotment
of coupons worth $5 off the ticket price on select concerts (read: not the
popular ones) that are buried in a series of hard to follow links. They still
have the same service charges like before, they're just more transparent about
it.

------
tn13
Not sure why the government attorneys should get paid anything here.
Government was so much incompetent here that they failed to catch VW well in
time, besides arresting few people in VW I think some people from the
government side need to be fired too.

The only worry here is that attorney generals might end up with more resources
to harass small people now.

------
togasystems
Could someone purchase one of these vehicles today and still be considered for
the buyback program?

------
eddd
Anyone knows if this 15B is treated as the "cost" of the business? In that way
effective income tax would be lower for VW.

------
london888
What's sad is how the word 'emission' is always used instead of the real word:
pollution.

------
xshareit
We should make a discussion about how we can prevent this kind of cases happen
again.

------
known
FB purchased Whatsapp for $15 billion :)

------
kejaed
Das Payout

------
blobbers
What about my lungs?

~~~
amaks
What about them?

------
rando18423
Only $15B?

~~~
jonknee
"Only" $15B for this part, but they still face Clean Air Act penalties and
another 80,000 vehicles with larger engines that aren't a part of this deal.

~~~
rconti
In the U.S. alone. And I think they only set aside $18B for the entire
scandal.

~~~
jonknee
Their biggest problem is by far the US because the emissions standards are
much higher in the US. But yes, they are going to need more cash.

------
roel_v
I lament the days where HN was a place for intelligent discussion. Today the
top post to submissions like this is an idiotic populist gut feeling, complete
with dubious metaphors, calls for violence, a complete lack of any
understanding of why things are the way the are and how we got there, as well
as a blissful ignorance of proposed and/or tried solutions to age-old
problems.

There must be something in the water these days that spurs these insults on
sane discourse, I have a vague feeling of recognition when going over current
events in politics across the world the last few weeks...

~~~
jacquesm
GP was on HN _long_ before you were. If you disagree with him, tell him why.

~~~
roel_v
His account is much older than mine, yes. I've been reading for about as long
as his account. No sure what the relevance of that is.

Anyway, I'm just using your comment to respond to several others at once that
all make roughly the same point. It's rather meta to the OP though, so maybe
it would better be detached from here (seeing that my response now seems to be
the top voted reply out of many, which is rather ironic in the light of the
following).

But on to my point: not all points or opinions should be 'reasoned' with, or
deserve an intellectually honest debate, or even a reply. To paraphrase the
old quip, 'don't wrestle a pig in the mud. You'll get dirty and the pig likes
it'. Many other commenters try to engage the GP in a fact-based 'debate', but
that is impossible with sophistic extremists who use terminology like
'corporate death penalty'. It's meant to incite an emotional reaction only.
There is no point in refuting Stormfront posters either, or Truthers, or pick
the fringe of any group that you ideologically disagree with.

Now I know that the general rule for posting here is 'don't post negative
things' and 'stick to substance and not the person' etc.; and my off handed
reply is essentially contrary to all those things; and I fully realize that
with this reply I'm polluting even more. My point is: there seems to be some
sort of naive believe that 'all opinions are equally valid', 'all viewpoints
deserve equal consideration' and 'the only way to respond to fringe/populist
rhetoric is with meticulous fact-based refutation'. That's simply not true.
Call me a 'reactionist' or a 'fascist censor' \- but I liked the days when
'letters to the editor' from lunatics were thrown in the bin and only those
with substance and without inciting language were published (I mean that
metaphorically, I was born in 1979, I'm from a generation where 'letters to
the editor' were already an anachronism). I'm not talking about shunning
content because of its content; but rather shunning content that employs mala
fides sophisms like purposefully using incendiary phrasing.

So in summary: no I won't be seduced into a useless 'debate'. And on top of
that, I would much prefer much more heavy-handed moderation where many more
posts were simply and summarily deleted (and yes that includes some of my own,
that were written too hastily) in order to increase the intellectual content
per 1000 words in the comments; failing that, we (as in, all posters) need to
ignore and/or shun extremism instead of giving it a podium by replying with
well-intentioned fact-based answers and thus attracting even more attention to
it.

~~~
jacquesm
> But on to my point: not all points or opinions should be 'reasoned' with, or
> deserve an intellectually honest debate, or even a reply.

> So in summary: no I won't be seduced into a useless 'debate'.

Then downvote or flag and move on. Your comment is as much a part of the
problem as the original was. If you make a comment make it a substantial one.

~~~
roel_v
I'm not sure if you're meta-trolling me by doing the exact thing I'm agitating
against (i.e., dishonest selective quoting, flippant dismissiveness,
dialectical rigidity), but I'll take the most generous interpretation and just
assume you're short on time and haven't fully internalized the point.

We're beyond the point of 'just' downvoting and 'moving on'. Sometimes some
needs to take a stand against moronification. I'm not volunteering to be that
person and maybe my original reply wasn't even in that category, but not
speaking up (and let's face it, downvoting doesn't count) lets this sort of
thing fester on. At the risk of beaten an old cliche'd horse - "first they
came for xyz [...] and then there was nobody to speak up left" etc. etc. I
don't mind the occasional post calling out utter rhetorical garbage; if only
to affirm that there are people left who don't mind debate as long as it's
done in honesty and in an informed way, rather than 'I have a [deity-
given|natural] right to shout whatever springs into my head at everybody
else'. If someone were to gauge opinion from online discourse, they'd have no
alternative but to conclude that there is nobody left who can hold an opinion
that is more complicated than 'THIS ME LIKE' or 'THIS ME HATE, MUST SMASH'.

"If you make a comment make it a substantial one."

That's rather ironic coming from someone who with two dismissive one-sentence
posts ignores a whole complex point being made - a point that, while it may
not be 'novel', is certainly contrary to the majority's concept of 'democracy'
and 'fairness'.

~~~
jacquesm
There is a time and a place to make that 'complex point' and I highly doubt
that hijacking a thread with wall-of-text posts like these will make that
point effectively.

As for your entry paragraph: such veiled accusations are also not worthy of
HN.

------
awt
Lysenkoism

~~~
r00fus
What does Russian anti-evolution ideology have to do with this settlement?

------
amaks
Thank you, Volkswagen!

