With EU nitrogen oxide emissions regularly breached on German roads, Angela Merkel’s government will act on banning older diesels from places plagued by car and truck pollution.
As reported by Autonews Europe, according to Deputy Environment Minister Jochen Flasbarth, the ordinance will be enacted this year and it will include diesel vehicles with emissions that don’t meet EU-Norm 6, which sets a NOx emission limit of 80 grams per kilometer – mandatory for all new diesel vehicles since 2015.
“This step is necessary as a stop gap until electric cars have a significant foothold in our towns, and diesel emissions really are what carmakers say they are: cleaner,” said Flasbarth in Berlin last week.
Even though these types of initiatives can be directly related to the VW scandal, the European Environment Association believes that fine particles emitted by diesel exhausts as well as NOx could cause as many as 10,000 deaths per year in Germany.
On the other hand, some 74% of BMW sales involve diesels, as do 67% of all new Audis, and only a third of Germany’s existing diesel cars fleet in 2015 were Euro 6, which will make it particularly tough for town and city councils to enforce bans that will restrict Euro 5 and older vehicles from getting around.
“It would be a fundamental mistake to badmouth diesels,” said the German car industry association. “Whoever supports climate protection can’t forgo diesels – environment ministers know this too.”
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