There's no way to make a diesel or gasoline car that's not actively bad for the environment. Electric is the only way. (And maybe hydrogen, but that's quite a ways off)
Cummins pickup truck engines tricked air quality controls, feds say
41–50 of 110 posts
Re: Cummins pickup truck engines tricked air quality controls, feds say
#42Earlier quoted context omitted.
One more reason it's time to transition away from burning stuff to produce energy.
Transition to what, exactly? Pixie dust? Unicorn farts? There's nothing to transition to .
Not to mention that they're often burning stuff behind the curtain to power the non-burning stuff.
As long as it's out of sight it's okay.
Re: Cummins pickup truck engines tricked air quality controls, feds say
#43Is there any article explaining what they actually did, or are alleged to have done? With the VW scandal, there was a fairly in-depth discussion of the technical aspects of it. But all the articles about Cummins seem exceedingly vague.
IIRC, VW had code to detect emissions testing and reduce performance at that time. What did Cummins do?
Re: Cummins pickup truck engines tricked air quality controls, feds say
#44There's no way to make a diesel or gasoline car that's not actively bad for the environment. Electric is the only way. (And maybe hydrogen, but that's quite a ways off)
unfortunately, saving the environment is currently a luxury item.
Re: Cummins pickup truck engines tricked air quality controls, feds say
#45Earlier quoted context omitted.
I know this is a popular take, but the blindspot is commercial engines. > bypass emissions sensors on 630,000 RAM pickup truck engines In this case, and in nearly _every report of a scandal_, the issue is with passenger vehicle engines, not commercial vehicle engines. Diesel engines can be engineered to meet emissions requirements without cheating, they just aren't except for commercial use.
Why is that? Are the parts necessary to meet emissions requirements extra expensive and so are only worth installing on commercial vehicles which are more expensive, vs passenger vehicles have a different profit margin, or is it something else, like commerical vehicles have lower standards for noise or higher standards for maintenance?
A combination of factors; cost, customer expectations, and convenience.
It's easy to produce a lot of power, it's not easy to do so reliably and within emissions specs. That's where the cost comes in, and where customer expectations come in. If VW is going to be offering a 110 kW 2.0 liter engine, well, Mercedes-Benz can't come in and offer a 90 kW 2.0 liter engine just to meet specs. At the end of the day, margins are fairly thin and regulators are compliant. It's cheaper to just cheat the emissions than make the engine meet emissions specs.
The convenience factor is diesel exhaust fluid (AdBlue); the stuff really does work very well. However, dispensing it at the most effective rate in regards to emissions would mean it has to be topped up between service intervals; very inconvenient. Increasing the tank size is a non-starter because packaging space in modern vehicles is at a premium. So the dirty secret (at least for Mercedes-Benz, confirmed by one of their engineers) is that they calibrate it to last service intervals; not to meet emissions. It's only in rare cases where the owner has to refill the tank themselves.
In regards to the AdBlue situation, if you're in Europe where there are a lot of diesel passenger vehicles and also a lot of diesel trucks and buses, next time you're in the city or on the highway, pay attention to the characteristic diesel stink, either as a pedestrian or a driver. You're never going to smell it from a truck; it'll always be a passenger vehicle. :)
Re: Cummins pickup truck engines tricked air quality controls, feds say
#46US company so a penalty that is less than the profit, "no wrongdoing admitted" (its a defeat device!), no criminal investigation (there would be precedent), press release goes out on the Friday before Christmas.
companies are voting blocs, so , you know, democracy inaction.
Re: Cummins pickup truck engines tricked air quality controls, feds say
#47VW did it Renault probably did it These guys probably did I think there was a point where regulators said "diesel puts out lung damaging levels of pollutants killing X people a year. We shall either ban diesel engines ... or make manufacturers make diesel engines that don't pollute that badly" So they set a safe level. And no manufacturer has been able to achieve the technology to meet that level. I know some manufac…
It’s actually worse than that - they set goals and then manufacturers started lying to meet those goals, which told the regulators that those goals were attainable and so they set new goals. The entire notion of clean diesel is a farce and has been built on lies from the outset.
No, some market participants did so.
However, customers and regulators had different requirements so meeting both was difficult without cheating.
Re: Cummins pickup truck engines tricked air quality controls, feds say
#48Earlier quoted context omitted.
One more reason it's time to transition away from burning stuff to produce energy.
Transition to what, exactly? Pixie dust? Unicorn farts? There's nothing to transition to .
From my experience, any car at all or even a bicycle could replace the majority of trips I see these trucks doing.
Re: Cummins pickup truck engines tricked air quality controls, feds say
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
> And no manufacturer has been able to achieve the technology to meet that level. Urea-injection seems to work (that's what Mercedes does). But it requires another tank and special equipment. And VW could meet the emissions requirements. That was the cheat. When they detected that they were being tested, they tuned the engine to meet emissions requirements. During normal use, the engine would make better power or eff…
I owned a Dodge ram diesel model that had one of these engines. It had urea injection, and I had to maintain the 2nd tank.
> I had to maintain the 2nd tank
"Hold up, I need to get a large soda--the urea tank is getting low."
Re: Cummins pickup truck engines tricked air quality controls, feds say
#50> The company does not admit wrongdoing and says no one in the company acted in bad faith Fuck me, though, right? I know the government can't do it, but this kind of statement itself should merit some kind of additional punishment.
I mean, we don’t have any details yet. What if the “defeat device” is something like “if $SENSOR is reading a little high, turn on service light and operate as normal otherwise” As a customer I’d be pissed if my truck wouldn’t run.