The recent Toyota emissions scandal is just the tip of the iceberg (Patreon)

[This is a transcript with links to references.]

A lot of climate targets are lip confessions.  But some of those confessions get written into law,  and that can create some, hmm, interesting tensions between what governments and companies say they’re doing and what the data say they’re doing. In the past weeks we have seen examples of this tension between words and reality in Japan, the EU, and the USA.

In Japan, Toyota  has to answer a lot of questions after it turned out that they manipulated the results of emissions tests, again. In Europe, lawmakers have been officially informed that their regulations on car emissions have had absolutely no effect.  An in the United States, scientists urge the Biden administration  to reconsider the export of liquified natural gas.Let’s look at those a little closer.

End of January, Toyota suspend the production on ten vehicles including the Hilux truck and Land Cruiser 300 SUV. This decision came after an independent panel uncovered irregularities on certifications for emission tests, dating back as far as 1989. The problem concerns three diesel engines developed by Toyota Industries, that were equipped with software which smoothed power output tests with the certainly entirely accidental result of making the cars look more environmentally friendly than they are.

Toyota is not new to the problem.  Already in 2022, it turned out that one of their company’s divisions faked emissions data for forklift and construction machinery vehicles. According to Fortune Magazine, Toyota CEO Koji Sato said that the company has an issue with  “understanding and respect with regards to certification” which is one way to put it.

You might remember that a similar thing happened in 2015 with Volkswagen,  whose emissions scandal became known as “Dieselgate”.  The problem surfaced after the American Environmental Protection  agency noticed that Volkswagen had installed software in its diesel vehicles that allowed them to pass regulatory tests,  while emitting higher levels of pollutants during real-world driving conditions.

Now, the pollutants in case of Dieselgate were nitrous oxides,  not carbon dioxide,  but the underlying issue is the same.  Companies clearly find emission regulations somewhat annoying and come up with creative solutions to try and avoid them. I wouldn’t be surprised at all if it turns out that many other companies are doing or at least have been doing the same. A certain lack of understanding and respect with regards to certification, as the Japanese CEO said so nicely.

But let’s move on and look at what’s going on with car emissions in the European Union.  An organization independent of the European parliament has recently found that the European regulations on car exhausts didn’t do what they were supposed to do, which was to bring down carbon dioxide emissions in transport.

This report comes from the European Court of Auditors  whose task it is to basically have an eye on what the European parliament does. They found that carbon dioxide emissions from cars have not dropped at all since the EU introduced its climate targets in 2012.

The major reason for this, the report reveals, is that while car engines have gotten cleaner, cars have also gotten heavier and larger. They say that the average car mass in the EU  has increased by approximately 10 percent between 2011 and 2022, accompanied by a  25 percent surge in engine power.

As a result, most cars on the road in the EU still emit roughly the same amount of carbon dioxide as they did 12 years ago.

They found that this holds even for hybrid cars,  which according to the auditgenerally produce much higher carbon dioxide emissions in the real world, on the road, than predicted by tests in the manufacturers’ laboratories. Surprise!

 The auditors say that emissions reductions will require more stringent checks on car manufacturers and that the EU needs to revise emission targets in light of the new data, both of which are probably good recommendations that will do very little.

Finally, we have scientists urging the United States Government  to rethink whether liquefied natural gas, LNG for short, is an improvement for the environment. LNG just as reminder is primarily methane  which just as a reminder is an extremely potent greenhouse gas. When burned it releases energy and leaves behind water and carbon dioxide  which just as a reminder is also a greenhouse gas. Doesn’t sound all that great for the climate does it.

 But the fossil fuel industry has tried to position LNG as a stepping stone on the way to net zero because it has lower carbon dioxide emissions than coal and oil.  And indeed,  it leaves behind only about half as much carbon dioxide per energy produced as coal  and still less than oil.  This is one of the major reasons why the Europeans, especially us poor Germans who don’t have nuclear power are importing gas from the United States. Yes, we do have a lot of coal,  but we’re being told to not dig it up. Of course we do it anyway, but heating with coal is an ugly mess, and so American gas is very welcome.  

But how much better for the climate is this so-called “natural” gas really?  Well, new studies have found that the previous estimates that it’s half as bad as coal were somewhat, shall we say, incomplete.  They didn’t take into account how much of the methane leaks during production and transport and these leaks, it turns out, make a substantial contribution to global warming. A new report now says that the numbers on methane leaks which mostly came from the companies who are selling the stuff turned out to be not terribly reliable. Surprise.

They find that which more reliable data, the life-cycle emissions that take into account all greenhouse gases throughout production and use, are at least 24 percent higher for natural gas than for coal.

Yes, they say that gas is actually worse than coal, at least when it comes to greenhouse gas emissions.

 This prompted climate scientists to write an open letter to the US president which attracted 170 signatures.

They call on President Biden to not go through with plans to increase the export of natural gas and in particular urge him to not build a new export terminal in Louisiana.


Hello,

Olaf? The German chancellor?

Alright, what’s up.

Yes, the report says coal is actually better but….

Olaf?