Nearly 30 mn diesel cars on EU roads over emissions limits

The recall in India has been termed as voluntary by the company but in other countries where emission regulation laws are strict, the recall has been mandatory.

The auto owners have filed a petition against the ministry three times on June 9, June 27 and August 1 to demand that Audi Volkswagen issues a replacement or a full refund on the vehicles. The recall by German auto manufacturer Volkswagen, which includes a total of 323,700 cars, was to begin by September.

Following last month’s decision by the government to issue fines of 17.8 billion won ($16 million) for 47 VW models alleged to have passed the local approval process by cheating on gas emissions tests, negotiations took place between both parties over potential recall measures and recertification processes. There are several engines under process, according to the spokesperson, and each of them is classified on the basis of factors like the capacity, model, year of manufacture and gearboxes.

The 2.0-litre EA189 diesel engine powering Volkswagen, Skoda and Audi cars will need only a software update to fix the problem.

While Volkswagen’s headquarters in Germany has given the go ahead to update these engines, individual approvals from the ARAI are necessary for each classification of engine.

A spokesman for Volkswagen UK said: ‘At Volkswagen Group UK, customers are our priority and every owner has been written to at least three times to keep them up to date.

T&A, however, said that the better performance of Volkswagen Euro 6 cars had nothing to do with Dieselgate, but with better technology choices made before the scandal erupted.

A year on from the discovery that Volkswagen diesel cars had been fitted with software to cheat emissions tests only around one in 10 of the affected cars have been repaired.

Volkswagen told the Press Association that “over 110,000 vehicles in the UK” had undergone remedial action, which is roughly ten per cent of the 1.2 million vehicles affected by the issue in the United Kingdom – a figure that Louise Ellman, Labour MP and chairwoman of the Transport Select Committee, described as “simply unacceptable”.

In the scandal that broke out first in the USA exactly a year back, all of Volkswagen, Audi, Porsche and Skoda models had been found to have the emission cheating devices with the TDI diesel engines. They were eventually found to have had 40 per cent higher emissions than the levels permitted.

Automakers selling cars in Europe aren’t even meeting the current standards, according to the study.