Scandal-hit car industry in the driving seat for new EU emissions regulations

 Making Smokeswagons is OK by the EU Lobbyists win again!

In the wake of Volkswagen’s diesel emissions scandal, Corporate Europe Observatory has obtained documents that show how the car industry has continued to undermine Europe’s proposed new emissions test standards. Close relations between the European Commission and the car industry in the drafting ensured numerous loopholes in the first package, which has already been approved by the Parliament. Most worryingly, pressure from Member States in the yet-to-be-approved second package, provides a loophole so big the car industry will be able to exceed proposed standards by at least 50% for the foreseeable future. A vote in Parliament on 3rd February against approving the second package offers the chance to put public health before short-term profit.


In the wake of Volkswagen’s diesel emissions scandal, Corporate Europe Observatory has obtained documents that show how the car industry has continued to undermine Europe’s proposed new emissions test standards. Close relations between the European Commission and the car industry in the drafting ensured numerous loopholes in the first package, which has already been approved by the Parliament. Most worryingly, pressure from Member States in the yet-to-be-approved second package, provides a loophole so big the car industry will be able to exceed proposed standards by at least 50% for the foreseeable future. A vote in Parliament on 3rd February against approving the second package offers the chance to put public health before short-term profit.

The #VWgate scandal exposed not just Volkswagen but the entire car industry’s huge discrepancy between their diesel emissions under laboratory conditions vs those out in the real world, where emissions are on average five times higher than legal limits. The European Environment Agency has estimated that approximately 75,000 premature deaths have occurred in Europe in 2015 alone as a result of nitrogen dioxide (NO2) pollution, a form of nitrous oxide which largely comes from diesel vehicles.