As “Dieselgate” turns one year old, a study by Transport & Environment reveals that Volkswagen is currently selling the least polluting Euro 6 diesel vehicles.
Nonetheless, the marque caught cheating in the US also has the most grossly polluting Euro 5 vehicles on the road, which were sold between 2011 and 2015 . The better performance of Volkswagen Euro 6 cars has nothing to do with the Dieselgate, but with better technology choices made before the scandal burst.
The report Dieselgate: Who? What? How? also found that not one single brand complies with the latest air pollution limits (‘Euro 6’) for diesel cars and vans in real-world driving.
T&E analysed emissions test data from around 230 diesel car models. Data were taken from the investigations conducted by the British, French and German governments, as well as a large public database. The carmakers’ ranking was built with on-road performance figures mostly measured in real world driving.
The key findings per car brand are: Fiat and Suzuki diesel cars on average pollute 15 times more than the legal NOx limit; Renault-Nissan vehicles exceed the limit more than 14 times; General Motors’ brands Opel/Vauxhall pollute 10 times more while Volkswagen diesel cars pollute twice as much as the Euro 6 standard.
