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The European Parliament has voted to ratify proposals, brought forward in the wake of the Volkswagen-triggered 'dieselgate' scandal, which will effectively allow car makers to exceed the officially stated Nitrogen Oxide (NOX) limits under the Euro6 regulations.
The new system includes the so-called Real Driving Element (RDE) in the tearing regime for official fuel economy and emissions figures. While that should, in theory, mean more rigorous enforcement of emissions regulations, in fact there is a clause, voted into being today, which allows car makers to exceed the official limits. While Euro6 caps NOX emissions at 80mg/km, the new rules say that the RDE figure can be as high as 110 per cent beyond that, or 168mg/km. A reduction, to 50 per cent over the limit, will come in to force in 2020.
Reacting to the vote, the ACEA, the umbrella group of Europe's car makers, cautiously welcomed the new regulations. "This regulation will be a major challenge for the industry, with new and more stringent testing standards that will be extremely difficult to reach in a short space of time," stated Erik Jonnaert, ACEA Secretary General. "However automobile manufacturers welcome the much-needed clarity, and are eager to move forward by implementing the new testing conditions as soon the regulation is adopted."
Others are incensed, though, that the car makers are effectively being told they can cheat on their emissions tests, saying that the result of the vote was heavily influenced by political and corporate lobbying. Greg Archer, clean vehicles director of Transport & Environment, said: "It's disgraceful that the most powerful countries in Europe think that keeping dirty diesel is good for their car industry while citizens are poisoned. The European Commission and progressive members of the European Parliament have fought tooth and nail to prevent a bad outcome but this wasn't sufficient to counter the pressure from EU national governments.
"There's only one way out of this scandal and that is to have an early review of the flexibility in the new test in 2017 and ensure all diesels meet the Euro6 rules on the road by 2021 at the latest. Until that happens, no one will consider diesel cars clean and cities may be forced to ban them to comply with EU air quality standards," he concluded.
Transport & Environment claims that 72,000 premature deaths across the EU are caused every year by factors attributable to emissions of nitrogen oxides.