Mercedes diesel owners file new lawsuit in United States

[Eugene]

Source: Reuters

World | Fri Apr 8, 2016 4:36am EDT

Mercedes diesel owners file new lawsuit in United States

Owners of Mercedes diesel cars filed a new class-action lawsuit in the United States saying the vehicles likely contained a "defeat device" used to cheat emissions testing, an accusation that Daimler (DAIGn.DE), which owns the carmaker, denied.

U.S. law firm Hagens Berman, which had already filed a complaint in February, said new tests had shown that Mercedes BlueTEC cars produced nitrogen oxide emissions in virtually all road tests that were far higher than in controlled lab tests.

"The fact that Mercedes passed the dynamometer test in all tests, but failed the real world test, is suggestive that like VW (VOWG_p.DE), Mercedes is implementing a 'defeat device'," it said in its complaint filed in the District Court of New Jersey.

Daimler said in a statement on Friday: "We consider this class action lawsuit to be unfounded. Our position remains unchanged: A component that inadmissibly reduces emissions is not used in Mercedes-Benz vehicles."

BlueTEC is a filter system which uses urea to help rid exhaust fumes of health threatening nitric oxides. It is fairly costly and used mainly in heavier cars like Diamler's large limousines or sports utility vehicles, which are equipped with powerful diesel engines.

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Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-volkswagen-emissions-daimler-idUSKCN0X50MI

[NNadir]

1. The BlueTEC device is a product of well known chemistry...

...but it will fail if the device is not properly maintained, i.e., by not assuring a supply of urea as a reactant.

Volkswagen fudged it's software when it was unable to produce an engine that did not require urea as a reactant, which was the goal that its engineers failed to realize. As I understand it, under enormous pressure, when they couldn't produce the engine, they fudged the data.

There are many fuel designs that might improve the environmental impact of diesel cars and trucks, possibly making them superior to gasoline engines, but good luck with getting the world to change the nature of diesel fuel.