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In 2015, regulators realized that diesel Volkswagens and Audis were emitting several times the legal limit of nitrogen oxides (NOx) during real-world driving tests. But one problem regulators confronted was that they couldn’t point to specific code that allowed the cars to do this. They could prove the symptom (high emissions on the road), but they didn’t have concrete evidence of the cause (code that circumvented US and EU standards).I don't understand this from a regulator's point of view: as a regulator, all you have to do is test for symptoms. You don't have to explain root causes. You drive the vehicle in conditions as close as possible to real ones, measure emissions, and decide whether or not they're above the norms.
Why would regulators do this in a lab? It's like health inspections that would ask restaurants to send food to be tested, instead of showing up anytime, unannounced.
Regulators should pick up real cars from real owners and test them on the road, at regular intervals.
Or, modern technology should allow to test a car all the time and report emissions and fuel efficiency, etc. during its lifetime.
People cheat, and if cheating is easy they cheat more. The one thing a regulator cannot do is trust the industry.
I don't understand this from a regulator's point of view: as a regulator, all you have to do is test for symptoms. You don't have to explain root causes. You drive the vehicle in conditions as close as possible to real ones, measure emissions, and decide whether or not they're above the norms.
Why would regulators do this in a lab? It's like health inspections that would ask restaurants to send food to be tested, instead of showing up anytime, unannounced.
Regulators should pick up real cars from real owners and test them on the road, at regular intervals.
Or, modern technology should allow to test a car all the time and report emissions and fuel efficiency, etc. during its lifetime.
People cheat, and if cheating is easy they cheat more. The one thing a regulator cannot do is trust the industry.