Latest diesel cars emit low on-road pollutant emissions, contrary to recent misleading claims

Under RDE, a car is driven on public roads over a wide range of conditions using portable measuring equipment. RDE complements the lab test, WLTP, to ensure that pollutant emission levels measured during the laboratory test are confirmed on the road.

“The claims from the new ‘TRUE’ study are misleading for consumers,” stated Erik Jonnaert, Secretary General of the European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association (ACEA). “EU policy makers will be equally disappointed that there is no acknowledgement that the latest Euro 6 diesel cars complying with the new RDE legislation are very clean.”

The claims made in this study are based on ‘remote sensing’ results collected between 2011 and 2017. They therefore do not evaluate the on-road performance of the latest diesel vehicles approved to the Euro 6d standard since September 2017.

Jonnaert: “As all cars tested as part of this ‘TRUE’ initiative were pre-Euro 6d vehicles, the fact that they do not meet emissions requirements that only became mandatory after they were put on the market is not surprising.”

The automobile industry has invested heavily to achieve significant improvements in emissions from RDE-compliant Euro 6 vehicles. Recent studies* have shown that these new diesel cars effectively deliver very low pollutant emissions not only in the laboratory, but also on the road. Indeed, the data from the newest Euro 6d diesel cars tested under the rigorous RDE test paint a very positive picture.

Research by FuelsEurope and the Association for Emissions Control by Catalyst (AECC) also shows that the latest generation of diesel vehicles will continue to play a major role in helping reach future CO2 targets. Likewise, these vehicles will also have a positive impact on improving air quality, along with other local measures, in areas where exceedance of NO2 remains a concern.