Dieselgate
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Dieselgate is a series of accusations, criminal charges, and civil lawsuits against the German company Volkswagen for supposedly cheating on emissions tests by programming its diesel cars to perform differently while tested. This 5-year saga has pushed the once-richest company in the world to shift to electric vehicles.[1]
The scandal began with reports in September 2015, and through March 2021 had cause the manufacturer an estimated €32.2 billion (roughly $37 billion) in fines, recalls, compensation and legal expenses.[2]
Then-California Attorney General Kamala Harris announced how the liberal state milked the large automaker:
| “ | As part of that $14.7 billion agreement, Volkswagen agreed to spend an estimated $10 billion to compensate consumers and buy back or modify hundreds of thousands of its polluting cars, pay $2.7 billion into a trust fund for environmental mitigation projects, and spend $2 billion over 10 years on zero-emission technology. Of the $4.7 billion in mitigation funding and investments, $1.18 billion will come to California ($800 million in zero-emissions technology investments and $380 million for environmental mitigation projects in the state).[3] | ” |
Volkswagen's car market share in the United States is approximately 5%.