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EPA Notifies Fiat Chrysler of Clean Air Act Violations

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Re: EPA Notifies Fiat Chrysler of Clean Air Act Violations

#81

Post by wonder_er »

xenadu02 wrote: post #41
wonder_er wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

there'd be no incentive to lie if the EPA wasn't forcing these "standards" on them. Now, there's no reason to innovate because someone spends big bucks to actually do what everyone else is lying about. This isn't damming of private industry - it's damming of the regulation. (Er, to me. Obviously you might come to a different conclusion. Just wanted to throw in how this article can be read both ways.)

If standards weren't forced on them we'd be living in smog-choked cities. Markets can't efficiently deal with tragedy-of-the-commons situations because the air belongs to everyone and there is no way to do price discovery. Even a manufacturer could advertise based on being eco-friendly the effects would be minuscule thus consumers would have little reason to prioritize such features. You're essentially claiming we sh…

I feel like there are more differences between China and the USA than just the EPA, and that's not at all what I was arguing.

What did you read my argument as? Can you restate my argument? Either I spoke unclearly, or you read poorly. So, let me figure this out.

Re: EPA Notifies Fiat Chrysler of Clean Air Act Violations

#82

Post by alphabettsy »

Zigurd wrote: post #26
avn2109 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you've ever been near a major automaker's test engineering lab, you quickly realize that ~all of them are doing shady things to hit their numbers. This is a result of the cold hard engineering fact that our current level of technology is insufficient to hit the numbers without raising costs significantly. But once one automaker starts to fudge the numbers at a given price point, all the others must do the same thi…

Another reason to think it's nearly industry-wide is that ECUs, ECU firmware frameworks, sensors, and interface firmware come from a small set of common suppliers. Anyone not hitting a competitor's' numbers knows their competitors are using the same hardware and much of the same software.

These organizations are obsessive about IP and they definitely don't share engine management code on a regular basis, even if they use the same ECU and the result is largely similar code.

Re: EPA Notifies Fiat Chrysler of Clean Air Act Violations

#83

Post by yuhong »

btilly wrote: post #80
yuhong wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

60 people was just an estimate from statistics, and NOx emissions are not a new problem either.

NOx emissions are not a new problem, and our ability to estimate its effects are pretty good. The exact number is an estimate, but the real number is very unlikely to be off by more than a factor of 2. If you randomly shoot 30 people, what is the appropriate penalty? What if you were shooting blindfolded and couldn't see when or who you killed? What if you were being paid money to take shots? That is an exact analogy…

I mean in the sense that the emissions before the EPA was created was far worse.

Re: EPA Notifies Fiat Chrysler of Clean Air Act Violations

#84

Post by LeifCarrotson »

yuhong wrote: post #58
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #33

Volkswagen, a German company, admitted wrongdoing, is paying $4.3bn in fines and will see its executives, domestic and overseas, jailed by the U.S. government [1]. Curious if Fiat Chrysler will see those checkboxes--admission of wrongdoing, material fines and jailed executives--filled. [1] http://abcnews.go.com/US/volkswagen-pleads-guilty-pays-43-bi...

I personally don't think that jail for simply emitting NOx above limits is worth it

It's less about emitting NOx, or an individual Chrysler owner being deceived about how much emissions their car produces. It's not even about a public policy requirement that aims to limit NOx emission, reducing smog and acid rain, which are bad.

In the end, it's about FCA lying to the government: claiming to meet the requirement while secretly working around it.

Re: EPA Notifies Fiat Chrysler of Clean Air Act Violations

#85

Post by ocschwar »

yuhong wrote: post #58
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #33

Volkswagen, a German company, admitted wrongdoing, is paying $4.3bn in fines and will see its executives, domestic and overseas, jailed by the U.S. government [1]. Curious if Fiat Chrysler will see those checkboxes--admission of wrongdoing, material fines and jailed executives--filled. [1] http://abcnews.go.com/US/volkswagen-pleads-guilty-pays-43-bi...

I personally don't think that jail for simply emitting NOx above limits is worth it

If they wrote software that does something wrong, then there is so much premeditation in this that jail time is a must.

Re: EPA Notifies Fiat Chrysler of Clean Air Act Violations

#86

Post by randomtossr88 »

munificent wrote: post #61
afterburner wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"This is a result of the cold hard engineering fact that our current level of technology is insufficient to hit the numbers without raising costs significantly. But once one automaker starts to fudge the numbers at a given price point, all the others must do the same thing or they fall behind." I'm going to have to remember to bring this up as an example whenever people claim private industry can police/regulate them…

> I'm going to have to remember to bring this up as an example whenever people claim private industry can police/regulate themselves. Do people actually claim that? That's insane. The natural state of all groups with the same interest is collusion. Self-policing only happens if there is a viable threat of even worse external policing. (Example: the Hays' code for films, which was only voluntarily established because…

> Do people actually claim that? That's insane.

You've never heard of Objectivism?

Re: EPA Notifies Fiat Chrysler of Clean Air Act Violations

#87

Post by wcunning »

enraged_camel wrote: post #36
TylerE wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The standards escalated way too fast though. They were asking for essentially multiple orders of magnitude improvement in a single generation. Even the dirtiest of the cheating VWs would have passed the previous standards (from not that many years ago) with flying colors.

>>The standards escalated way too fast though. Um, no. The EPA didn't pull the numbers out of their asses. They worked with the auto industry to come up with requirements that were stringent but realistic. Government agencies are commonly criticized for regulating industries that they have no expertise in. In reality though, things don't work that way. Either the regulators themselves have industry experience (what i…

The 2025 CAFE standards seem to be a dramatic rise in requirement in a short time period wherein the industry attempted to provide alternative advise and was soundly rebuffed, even outright ignored. The EPA may have once listened, but they don't seem to anymore.

Re: EPA Notifies Fiat Chrysler of Clean Air Act Violations

#88

Post by bit_logic »

This is all happening because at some point the car companies had this choice to make:

1) Deprecate/shutdown gas-only car factories, build hybrid factories with an upgrade roadmap to plugin-hybrid and eventually EV. Then make all models and all trim levels (from base to premium) hybrid as a starting point

2) Continue using gas-only car factories to get more ROI and profit, use shady tactics that either secretly violate EPA regulations or at best comply with the letter of the law, but not the spirit of the law. Make a few hybrid factories to profit from the eco-friendly market.

Look at the new car market today, it's clear which option the car companies picked.

Re: EPA Notifies Fiat Chrysler of Clean Air Act Violations

#89

Post by draw_down »

ssully wrote: post #52
draw_down wrote: post #46

Oh, oh, let me guess: it's the fault of a single rogue engineer, and does not in any way implicate company upper management.

I am assuming your comment is referencing Volkswagen's emissions controversy? It doesn't really fit considering six executives have been charged [1] over the incident. [1]: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/11/business/volkswagen-diese...

That's nice. I was referring to this: http://www.reuters.com/article/volkswagen-emissions-congress...

Re: EPA Notifies Fiat Chrysler of Clean Air Act Violations

#90

Post by mrgoldenbrown »

munificent wrote: post #61
afterburner wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"This is a result of the cold hard engineering fact that our current level of technology is insufficient to hit the numbers without raising costs significantly. But once one automaker starts to fudge the numbers at a given price point, all the others must do the same thing or they fall behind." I'm going to have to remember to bring this up as an example whenever people claim private industry can police/regulate them…

> I'm going to have to remember to bring this up as an example whenever people claim private industry can police/regulate themselves. Do people actually claim that? That's insane. The natural state of all groups with the same interest is collusion. Self-policing only happens if there is a viable threat of even worse external policing. (Example: the Hays' code for films, which was only voluntarily established because…

>Do people actually claim that? That's insane.

Agreed. And yet, here in the United States that claim is a central plank in the Republican platform.

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