Are manufacturers still cheating on fuel consumption and emissions figures? The EU thinks so.

On 1 September, the new homologation regulations for consumption and emissions using the WLTP and RDE tests will come into force in the European Union and will affect all vehicles sold in its territory. A regulation that began to apply transitionally in September 2017 to all new vehicles.

The WLTP regulation replaces the previous NEDC and its main consequence will be a rise in homologated average consumption: many of the cars already on the European market will see their homologated average consumption and emissions increase. The same will happen to the average range of electric vehicles, which will be reduced compared with current values.

For car manufacturers this is a problem, as many models that currently declare CO₂ emissions below 95 g/km will no longer be below the threshold that allows them to avoid paying the registration tax, which will make their purchase price more expensive for customers by approximately 5 percent of the car’s current value. The same will happen with many vehicles in the higher tax categories which, after passing the WLTP tests, will move up to the next step of the tax scale, with a similar percentage increase in their price.

All models on the market must pass the test before 1 January 2020, a date that will serve as the standard benchmark for future consumption and emissions requirements applied to the ranges and models of the various brands. Thus, by 2030, the average consumption and emissions allowed by the EU must be 30 percent lower than that achieved by the manufacturer and its models in 2020.

And as the saying goes, once the law is made, the loophole is found. Manufacturers always split hairs, even more so in the long term. Indeed, fearing that some will not be able to meet the future limits, some manufacturers may be “inflating” the results of their current models, recording results between 13 and 15 percent above the models’ real emission levels. By setting higher figures for current results, it would be easier for them to pass the future tests that require that percentage reduction.

In this regard, the European Commission has already detected some such actions by car manufacturers when running the first WLTP tests. Deactivating various software functions of the car during the tests, such as the one that regulates the operation of the Start/Stop system, or following certain strategies when shifting gears, would allow manufacturers to increase the consumption and emissions of certain models when passing the WLTP and RDE tests.

For this reason, the European Commission has alerted the member countries to be extremely vigilant when establishing these first homologated emission and consumption levels of the different manufacturers. In a letter addressed to the European Parliament, the European commissioners warn and draw the attention of the various countries to this fact, cautioning that data have already been collected and it has been “detected that manufacturers may use the transition from the old European homologation cycle (NEDC) to the new WLTP test to inflate their emission levels in 2020“. According to the commissioners, “increasing WLTP emissions in 2020 could result in less stringent CO₂ emissions by raising the reference results, thereby distorting a playing field that must be balanced among the rest of the manufacturers”.

For all these reasons, the commission in charge proposes that the new emission and consumption standards be calculated according to the results obtained in the actual WLTP tests rather than those declared by the manufacturers, and also warns of the need to closely monitor the development and correct conduct of those tests, even announcing a possible modification of the protocol to be followed in them if necessary.