VW ‘hardly’ lied about CO2 figures.
Wolfsburg – Allegations that Volkswagen lied about the carbon dioxide emissions of up to 800 000 cars appeared to evaporate into thin air on Wednesday as the embattled German carmaker said they had been proven to be largely unfounded. “Just a month after questions relating to the CO2 figures measured on some of the group’s models arose, Volkswagen has largely concluded the clarification of the matter,” the company said in a statement. “Following extensive internal investigations and measurement checks, it is now clear that almost all of these model variants do correspond to the CO2 figures originally determined,” the statement said. “This means that these vehicles can be marketed and sold without any limitations.An initial investigation into the Volkswagen Group’s array of cheating scandals has cleared the carmaker of claims it systematically cheated on CO2 figures.Frankfurt: Volkswagen AG rose the most in almost two weeks after a report that the carmaker has drastically lowered its estimate for the number of vehicles affected by a probe into irregular carbon-dioxide emissions.
While the investigations continue in the NOx emissions scandal, the more recent inquiry into claims it sold up to 800,000 cars with the wrong CO2 figures has found that only nine VW models currently on sale are wrongly calculated, with the total number affected now estimated to be in the region of 36,000. VW said last month it had falsified fuel usage and CO2 emissions in about 800,000 cars sold mainly in Europe, and was expecting costs of at least €2bn including compensation payments to customers.
VW is currently engulfed in a massive pollution-scandal that had initially centred on so-called defeat devices, sophisticated software fitted into diesel engines to skew the results of tests for nitrogen oxide emissions. The affected models on sale are: VW Polo 1.0l TSI BlueMotion 70kW Seven-speed (DSG); VW Scirocco 2.0l TDI BMT 135kW Six-speed manual gearbox; VW Jetta 1.2l TSI BMT 77kW Six-speed manual gearbox; VW Jetta 2.0l TDI BMT 81kW Five-speed manual gearbox; VW Golf Convertible 2.0l TDI BMT 81kW five-speed manual gearbox; VW Golf 2.0l TDI BMT 110kW Six-speed manual gearbox; VW Passat Alltrack 2.0l TSI 4MOTION BMT 162kW Seven-speed (DSG); VW Passat Variant 2.0l TDI SCR 4MOTION BMT 176kW Seven-speed (DSG); and VW Passat Variant 1.4l TSI ACT BMT 110kW Six-speed manual gearbox.
The car firm has already put aside €6.7bn (£4.7bn) to meet the cost of recalling 11 million diesel vehicles worldwide that were fitted with so called “defeat devices” that circumvented tests for emissions of nitrogen oxides. Germany’s newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reported earlier on Wednesday that VW’s malfeasance on CO2 emissions has now been found to affect fewer than 40,000 cars. The emissions figures for these cars are believed to be out by one or two grammes, which means not all of the revised CO2 figures will impact on either Vehicile Registration Tax payments or motor tax rates. The scandal was revealed in September by US regulators, who said the software detected when vehicles were undergoing emissions tests and changed the way they operated.
Volkswagen revealed in November that it had misrepresented carbon-dioxide emissions on vehicles, opening a new front in a crisis that originally focused on cheating on tests for diesel pollutants. But on November 3, the auto giant revealed an internal probe had uncovered “inconsistencies” on carbon emissions as well, affecting not only diesel engines but petrol engines, too.
In Ireland only six of the nine models affected are on sale, as Irish dealers don’t stock the 1-litre petrol engined Polo, Passat Alltrack, or the Golf Convertible. The carbon-dioxide issue was potentially even more expensive and complicated because it also affected gasoline cars and there’s no fix, leaving no alternative to compensating customers and tax authorities. A statement by Volkswagen said: “The suspicion that the fuel consumption figures of current production vehicles had been unlawfully changed was not confirmed. During internal remeasurements slight deviations were found on just nine model variants of the Volkswagen brand. “These model variants will be remeasured by a neutral technical service under the supervision of the appropriate authority by Christmas. In the case of any deviations, the figures will be adjusted in the future in the course of the normal processes as required.” An internal whistleblower had informed Volkswagen Group chief executive Matthias Müller that an array of its cars were claiming “improbably low” CO2 numbers, which had a direct effect on their tax status in most European countries.
However it now seems the initial investigation report, due to be presented on Thursday by Müller, will show that Volkswagen’s engineering and compliance teams acted within the guidelines for CO2 emissions. The report will cite combined efforts of investigators from the German Transport Department (KBA), public prosecutors, Volkswagen’s own staff investigators and the independent US law firm, Jones Day, which it commissioned to deliver an internal investigation into both the NOx and CO2 scandals. The news will come as an enormous boost to the embattled Volkswagen, with 11 million cars affected by its separate four-cylinder diesel NOx emissions-cheating scandal and a newer V6 turbodiesel default-code cheating scandal. It means Volkswagen can pocket or redirect the €2 billion it had set aside to compensate owners and national tax offices from the CO2 “cheat”, and also effectively closes down a CO2-related tax fraud investigation started weeks ago by the Braunschweig public prosecutor’s office. The initial CO2 cheat claims, announced in October by Müller, centred around 800,000 Audis, Seats, Skodas and Volkswagen cars and included diesel-powered engines and cylinder-on-demand four-cylinder petrol engines.
It led to Volkswagen being given an ultimatum by the European Commission and into the opening of a criminal investigation by a German public prosecutor. It also forced Volkswagen into high-level negotiations with tax offices around Europe, where officially claimed CO2 figures are used to calculate road tax levels. “There is a list of adjustments that can be made within the rules for CO2 testing and the investigation found that everything that has been done by Volkswagen is within those rules,” a source insisted. “The cars are initially tested as pre-production cars to arrive at an initial CO2 figure and NEDC figure, then they have to be retested again within six months when the full production models are available. The carmaker is still working with the California Air Review Board and the Environmental Protection Agency to deliver fixes for the NOx Dieselgate cars in North America. “In Europe, the limit for NOx is 80 milligrams per kilometre.