{"id":3754,"date":"2015-10-22T10:20:08","date_gmt":"2015-10-22T14:20:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ncjolt.org\/?p=3754"},"modified":"2020-06-04T20:53:33","modified_gmt":"2020-06-04T20:53:33","slug":"cheaters-never-win-the-volkswagen-scandal-rolls-on","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/blogs\/cheaters-never-win-the-volkswagen-scandal-rolls-on\/","title":{"rendered":"Cheaters Never Win: The Volkswagen Scandal Rolls On"},"content":{"rendered":"

If Volkswagen aspired to cement themselves in the consumer conscience, they have undoubtedly succeeded, just probably not in the way their public relations department would have chosen. \u00a0The company\u2019s ongoing scandal<\/a>, considered by many to be one of the largest corporate disgraces in recent history, has raised questions from concerned customers, environmental advocates, and legal commentators alike<\/a>.\u00a0 One of the latest inquiries of note has been that involving the legality of the new emissions-control devices installed on Volkswagen’s 2016 diesel models<\/a>.\u00a0 Although Volkswagen has already admitted to installing illegal software on its 2009-2015 diesel models, it remains unclear whether these same alterations are also present in the current model year.
\nSo, how exactly did Volkswagen end up in this position? To briefly recap, the news about the German automobile manufacturer\u2019s misfeasance broke in a major way on September 18, 2015, when the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) presented Volkswagen with a Notice of Violation<\/a>.\u00a0 The Notice arose out of the EPA\u2019s finding that Volkswagen had deliberately installed \u201cdefeat devices<\/a>\u201d on the majority of their diesel models released over the past six years.\u00a0 These devices essentially allowed Volkswagen to circumvent the emissions standards<\/a> set by the EPA for all new vehicles marketed and sold within the United States.\u00a0 When operating normally, the affected cars emitted up to forty times<\/a> the amount of nitrogen oxides allowed by law.\u00a0 While undergoing emissions testing, however, the cars\u2019 emissions controls would operate as the EPA intended them to<\/a>.
\nVolkswagen\u2019s stock<\/a> wasn\u2019t the only thing that took a hit in the wake of scandal; the company will have a hard road ahead of it if they intend to rebuild their reputation with both customers and regulators.\u00a0 Although the company has claimed that degenerate engineers<\/a>, rather than executives, were responsible for installing the defeat devices, it is the executives who will have to answer publicly for the egregious error.<\/p>\n

Installing the defeat devices\u2014regardless of whether or not the corporate brass signed off on it\u2014constituted a clear violation of the Clean Air Act, which means Volkswagen is potentially liable for civil penalties<\/a> on top of and beyond their public disgrace.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 
\nThe Clean Air Act<\/a>, originally enacted in 1970, has at its core the goal \u201cto protect and enhance the quality of the Nation\u2019s air resources so as to promote the public health and welfare and the productive capacity of its population,\u201d and does so by establishing National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) to regulate emissions of hazardous air pollutants<\/a>.\u00a0 Given the gravity of the Act\u2019s stated mission, it is perhaps not surprising that Volkswagen\u2019s President and CEO, Michael Horn, has already been called in to testify<\/a> before Congress.\u00a0 In his statement before the House Committee on Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, Horn admitted that the defeat devices were installed “for the express purpose of beating [emissions] tests<\/a>,” although he was personally unaware of the devices\u2019 existence prior to meeting with regulators on September 3, 2015.\u00a0 The hearing closed with Volkswagen\u2019s fate still unclear, although the EPA purportedly plans to pursue a massive forced recall of the affected models and impose up to $18 million in fines<\/a>, a far cry from the relative slaps on the wrist imparted in many cases of corporate wrongdoing.
\nThe fate of the company\u2019s 2016 diesel models remains similarly undetermined.\u00a0 The company has already admitted<\/a> that its 2016 models \u201ccontain emissions software \u2018that would potentially help their exhaust systems run cleaner during government tests,\u2019\u201d but not to the same extent as the much maligned defeat devices.\u00a0 Amidst all the uncertainty, however, it remains clear that a serious gaff by a single company will likely have sweeping ramifications for the entire automobile industry and ultimately determine the rigor of emissions testing<\/a> they can expect to face going forward.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If Volkswagen aspired to cement themselves in the consumer conscience, they have undoubtedly succeeded, just probably not in the way their public relations department would have chosen. \u00a0The company\u2019s ongoing scandal, considered by many to be one of the largest corporate disgraces in recent history, has raised questions from concerned customers, environmental advocates, and legal …<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3755,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[51],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3754"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3754"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3754\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7274,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3754\/revisions\/7274"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3755"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3754"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3754"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3754"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}