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Emissions Blamed for 1,260 Premature Deaths
March 13, 2017
Emissions Blamed for 1,260 Premature Deaths
CAMBRIDGE, Massachusetts, March 13, 2017 (ENS) – Scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and two other institutions report that Volkswagen’s emissions in excess of the legal standards have had a deadly effect on public health not just in Germany but across Europe and in the United States.
In September 2015, the German Volkswagen Group, the world’s largest car producer, admitted to having installed “defeat devices” in 11 million diesel cars sold worldwide between 2008 and 2015.
The devices were designed to detect and adapt to laboratory tests, making the cars appear to comply with environmental standards when, in fact, they emitted pollutants called nitric oxides, or NOx, at levels that were on average four times the applicable European test-stand limit.
While Volkswagen has issued recalls of affected vehicles in both the United States and Europe, scientists at MIT, Harvard University and Hasselt University in Belgium have found the excess emissions have already affected public health.
The team previously estimated that the excess emissions generated by the 482,000 affected vehicles sold in the United States will cause approximately 60 premature deaths.
Now the researchers have looked more closely at Volkswagen’s home base, examining the health impact from the 2.6 million affected cars sold in Germany under Volkswagen Group’s brands VW, Audi, Skoda, and Seat.
Read more at Environment News Service.
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