$50000 grant at University of West Virginia brought down Volkswagen

The WVU engineer set out to compare the emissions of diesel cars from the US and Europe.

Then they drove the vehicles up and down the West Coast, testing their performance in a variety of real-world driving conditions, from city streets to mountain roads.

The Volkswagen defeat device emissions scandal has been hitting all the auto news headlines in the last week, ever since the EPA revealed that VW was using software to scam it NOx emissions in testing – and VW admitted guilt.

His team found that although the VW cars were emitting massively more NOx than they should have been, the third vehicle on the test – a BMW X5 – performed really well, with emissions in the real world at, or below, its certification levels.

Daniel Carder and his research team at West Virginia University had no desire to take down a giant, but they did.

At the CARB test facility, “these vehicles were performing just as we would imagine”, Carder said.

A five-person engineering team at West Virginia University led by Daniel Carder first discovered discrepancies in the emissions rates for VW vehicles way back in 2013.

Carder said he’s surprised to see such a hullabaloo now, because his team’s findings were made public almost a year and a half ago.

In the movie version of this story, this is the scene where a bigwig from VW calls the Fatherland and snorts into the phone something about “das hillbillies from Vest Virginia!” and everyone roars with laughter and merrily heads to the nearest bauhaus for a round of pilsner.

In informing Volkswagen of the violations, the EPA and CARB cited WVU’s research.

Once the findings were confirmed, Carder’s team went to VW and told them.

Carder and his team initially though their testing was faulty because the results of their road tests were so out of whack with EPA standards.

Other work the nonprofit Center for Alternative Fuels Engines and Emissions has done over the years includes emissions research on tractor-trailer fleets for private companies, military combat and tactical ground vehicles for a defense contractor, and high-speed passenger ferries. Confronted with data from WVU’s tests in 1998, Caterpillar and Cummins quietly agreed to pay $83.4 million in civil penalties.

Carder’s team comprises of two graduate students, a research professor, a faculty member and himself.