VW likely to ‘buy back 115000 cars in US’

It’s been months since the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) revealed that Volkswagen had admitted it installed illegal “defeat device” software on its TDI diesel cars.

Within the first few minutes of his keynote address, he was also apologizing yet again for the emissions scandal that has left the company’s future in doubt, by some estimates costing it $80 billion.

Vehicles caught up in the scandal are powered by 2.0 and 3.0-litre diesel engines. Diess did not say whether VW was discussing that, but said he was optimistic an agreement with US regulators would be reached soon.

This comes as the company’s CEO Matthias Mueller is due to meet the EPA in January.

According to unnamed sources cited by Bloomberg, the vehicles – which include some Audi models – may be too hard or too old to fix.

Its diesel cars had been marketed to consumers as an eco-friendly alternative to traditional fuel, and at one point its owners were entitled to federal tax credits for reducing emissions.

The U.S. Justice Department sued Volkswagen this week over emissions-cheating software, potentially exposing the company to billions of dollars in penalties for clean air violations.

The lawsuit – which was filed in eastern MI but will be moved to a court in northern California, where other class-action lawsuits against VW are pending – accuses the automaker of four counts of violating the U.S. Clean Air Act, including tampering with its cars’ emissions control systems.

Diess also stated that the company is working to fix the 11 million diesel vehicles that were outfitted with modern technology that covered up pollutants that otherwise would have caused drivers to fall short emission tests.

Later in the presentation, Volkswagen executives announced the company’s new commitment to building electric vehicles. It was noted that the carmaker had made an admission worldwide that their cars emitted more nitrogen oxide than is permissible under normal driving conditions but denied liability because the computer software did not fall under a technical description of a defeat device. “This world is changing so much faster than our traditional world” of automotive suppliers.