Posted on 10/05/2015 1:18:39 PM PDT by robowombat
VW's Illegal Emissions Caused Dozens Of U.S. Deaths, Study Finds Mon, 10/05/2015 - 10:00am Ellen Knickmeyer,
Volkswagen's pollution-control chicanery has not just been victimless tinkering, killing between five and 20 people in the United States annually in recent years, according to an Associated Press statistical and computer analysis.
The software that the company admitted using to get around government emissions limits allowed VWs to spew enough pollution to cause somewhere between 16 and 94 deaths over seven years, with the annual count increasing more recently as more of the diesels were on the road. The total cost has been well over $100 million.
That's just in the United States. It's likely far deadlier and costlier in Europe, where more VW diesels were sold, engineers said. Scientists and experts said the death toll in Europe could be as high as hundreds each year, though they caution that it is hard to take American health and air quality computer models and translate them to a more densely populated Europe.
"Statistically, we can't point out who died because of this policy, but some people have died or likely died as a result of this," said Carnegie Mellon environmental engineer professor Peter Adams. He calculates the cost of air pollution with a sophisticated computer model that he and the AP used in its analysis.
Computer software allowed VW diesel cars to spew between 10 to 40 times more nitrogen oxides (NOx) than allowed by regulation, making this "clearly a concern for air quality and public health," said Janet McCabe, acting air quality chief for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
Nitrogen oxides mostly form smog — that murky, dirty air that makes it hard to see and for some people to breathe — but also amplify a deadlier, larger problem: tiny particles of soot. Numerous medical studies show those tiny particles cause about 50,000 deaths a year in the United States, mostly from heart problems.
Nitrogen oxides can travel hundreds of miles, so pollution spewed in Pittsburgh can be felt on the East Coast, Adams said.
Experts calculate how much pollution costs society by looking at the value of lost lives. In this case, Adams and other said the lost lives — valued at $8.6 million apiece — overwhelm other costs such as lost work days or hospital costs. The overall annual cost of the extra pollutants from the VW diesels ranged from $40 million to $170 million, environmental engineering professors calculated.
"Even the small increase in NOx from VW diesel emissions is likely to have worsened pollution along the roadways where they have traveled, and affected the lives of hundreds of thousands of people," said Dan Greenbaum, president of the Health Effects Institute in Boston.
"To say millions of people of people are breathing poor air as the result of that is not off the mark," said Greenbaum, who runs the institute that is funded by both the EPA and the auto industry to serve as an independent arbiter of the science.
In a response Saturday night to an earlier request for comment, Volkswagen said the EPA has noted that the affected vehicles do not present a safety hazard and are legal to drive. "General allegations regarding links between NOX emissions from these affected vehicles and specific health effects are unverified. We have received no confirmed reports that the emissions from such vehicles caused any actual health problem," the company said in a statement.
The calculations should be put in context of air that is getting dramatically cleaner in the United States, experts said. Also, the deaths from extra pollution are dwarfed by the 35,000 people in the U.S. a year who die in auto accidents and are closer to the annual U.S. death toll of spider or snake bites.
The AP calculated how much pollution was spewed year by year, starting with that broad 10 times to 40 times emissions level estimate from the EPA, then factoring in mileage and car number totals from EPA, the car company and Kelley Blue Book.
The results show an upper and lower limit of extra nitrogen oxides pollution allowed by VW's subterfuge. The AP took those figures to scientists who previously created a sophisticated computer program that looks at air movement and numerous epidemiological studies on the health effects of pollutants. The result was a rough estimate on deaths and costs to society based on a certain amount of pollution triggering each death.
The EPA has its own open source computer model that calculates death and social costs of emissions, roughly finding it takes nearly 1,300 tons of nitrogen oxides to cause one death. Using that calculation and AP's emission totals, the total death figures over the past seven years range from 12 to 69, slightly lower than the AP calculations.
The AP ran its calculations and results by more than a dozen experts in emissions, risk and public health. They all confirmed the calculations and results seemed right. One scientist had even done a statistical analysis on his own and came independently to the same conclusion. The experts were mostly university professors or from research institutes. They were not environmental advocates or representatives of auto companies.
But engineers caution that these figures come with many caveats and are ballpark estimates. They rely on many assumptions and a range of potential emissions per car. Air pollution impacts on people are usually calculated on a local level because that's where it is felt, and it changes from place to place. But these calculations were broadened to a national level, which adds more uncertainty.
The computer simulation that made the death calculations use conservative medical studies as their baseline. Other epidemiological studies would more than double the deaths and health costs, said Adams and model co-creator Jinhyok Heo of Cornell University.
Clamps hold probes in the tailpipes of a 2010 Volkswagen Jetta TDI on the campus of North Carolina State University in Raleigh, N.C., on Monday, Sept. 28, 2015. The car belongs to environmental engineering student, who was allowing North Carolina State University engineering professor Chris Frey to test the car's emissions. Frey has been testing the VW diesels in real world conditions, driving more than 100 miles with monitors in the car tailpipes. He found pollution 10 times higher than the federal standard, and noticed that the worst pollution came as he got on to highways and in stop-and-go traffic. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Chris Frey, an engineering professor at North Carolina State University, has been testing the VW diesels in real world conditions, driving more than 100 miles with monitors in the car tailpipes. He found pollution 10 times higher than the federal standard, and noticed that the worst pollution came as he got on to highways and in stop-and-go traffic. Those less desirable areas are where poorer people live, Greenbaum and other experts said.
Since 2008, VW sold more than 10 million VW diesel cars in Europe, compared with less than half a million in the United States. In Europe, the population is more densely packed in urban areas, making people more vulnerable to added air pollution, several experts said.
"Assuming most of the cars are in Europe, it's pretty simple to estimate that it could go as high as hundreds," said Robert Rohde, a physicist and lead scientist at the Berkeley Earth team that has estimated death tolls of air pollution in the past.
ery irresponsible reporting! This is not a "study" - it's computer modeled conjecture. There are absolutely NO links between VW emissions and deaths. "Caveats" and "ballpark estimates"? VERY misleading headline. 5 • Reply•Share › Avatar Eric Peterson Winston • 5 hours ago The physiological effects of small increases in NOx would be down in the noise. Basically the studies show that it takes a lot of NO2 to cause any effects and it must be combined with particulates or other lung irritants. NO2 alone did not do anything. Scaling that up into the population, mainly asthmatics and mainly in otherwise polluted areas is basically guesswork. The error bars, especially a few days after exposure would invalidate any conclusion like "16 to 94" above. 3 • Reply•Share › Avatar Mfg Eng Winston • 4 hours ago Agree. This article is complete conjecture drivel. There is no link between any death and the failure of VW to meet emission requirements. The editor of this should be ashamed. 2 • Reply•Share › Avatar Jeffrey • 5 hours ago I think the basic problem with these computer models for pollution health effects is that they use a "linear, no threshold" model. That is, they assume that if N people die if you make them breathe a 50% NOx atmosphere, then 0.1*N people die if they breathe a 5% NOx atmosphere, and 0.000001*N people die if they breathe a 0.00005% NOx atmosphere.
This is convenient for scare-mongering, because you can ALWAYS give a number of "increased deaths" for any degree of pollution whatsoever, no matter how minuscule.
That may seem reasonable, but fundamentally those arguments are absurd. As I understand it, if we breathe 100% oxygen at atmospheric pressure, we can suffer a number of ill effects; at high enough partial pressures, we die. Does that mean that 20% of people have these effects because of breathing oxygen at the normal ~20% oxygen content of the air? And that 0.2% would suffer these effects breathing 0.2% oxygen? No - EVERYONE WOULD BE DEAD if they breathed 0.2% oxygen, because we need it to survive!
I think there are similar paradoxical effects of radiation exposure. This effect is referred to as "hormesis." Of course if we receive megadoses we die, but if we receive one millionth of the deadly dose, one out of a million does not die; in fact, things like cancer rates apparently decrease when this happens.
Of course these AP distorters won't tell you this, in fact they may very well not even know it. But it's true nonetheless that these studies are usually based on this flawed logic. 3 • Reply•Share › Avatar George Moore • 5 hours ago What a pile of distorted conjecture and pure crap! Tell us by name who those 5-20 people that were killed. You are about as scientific as a child in kindergarten. Did you and the pupet of Odummer (EPA) actually come up with any proof or just a fairy tale conjecture. What about the number of people killed by all the exhaust from Air Force 1 as HE took all of his worhtless trips and vacations on our dime? 3 • Reply•Share › Avatar chris holman George Moore • 4 hours ago Have you any idea how immature and stupid your comments make you appear? Have no intellect? This is not put together by children these people are not making facts up as those on the right do upon hearing a discerning word, this is about human life and the fact that we should be advanced enough by 2015 that Neanderthals such as you would wake up and realize these are matters we can do something about to benefit all humans. And maybe get these corporations to do the right thing. And yes I am a LIBERAL and quite proud of it. Union too! • Reply•Share › Avatar Old pump guy chris holman • 4 hours ago Dear Chris, What George said may be a little immature but certainly not stupid. Take a close look at the so called "facts" in this report and then look at sources of NOX. In new England in 2011, all combustion sources combined produced 362,200 tons of NOX. 28% by gasoline cars on the roads; 19% by diesel vehicles (Cars, trucks, buses) 19%; off-road diesel use 10%. The rest by other combustion of fuels to produce energy, heat homes, etc. The POINT is, though 16 to 94 people in the US may have dies due to NOX created smog, these deaths can NOT be pinned to a small number of slightly dirty small cars. Yes, VW was wrong to cheat but you are not open minded enough to recognize this article as pure, unadulterated fear mongering. 3 • Reply•Share › Avatar Jeremy Jackson • 5 hours ago Just setting VW up for the deep-pocket plunge by BHO and his EPA Dip-S**ts. There is NO way they can say with A-N-Y certainty that any deaths have been specifically attributed to VW or any of their vehicle models. Talk about a witch hunt! 3 • Reply•Share › Avatar 4DMessiah Jeremy Jackson • 10 minutes ago What makes you think that:
A. Obama’s EPA will be doing anything about this when it is resolved?
B. That the EU, where 95% of those affected reside, has no priority to take action against one of their own, over the priorities of the USA?
C. That any politician ANYWHERE has anything to do with what VW created for itself - and that in creating it, they were thinking “hope that Schwartze wins in the USA in 2008! We can blame it on him around the world!”
BEWARE THE DIHYDROGEN MONO OXIDE!! • Reply•Share › Avatar tsimitpo • 3 hours ago The word "Study" is just disguise for propaganda. I don't know the last time I saw one that wasn't paid for by an entity with an agenda. 2 • Reply•Share › Avatar tbarge1 • 4 hours ago These are the same morons and grant seekers that are screaming about global warming. 2 • Reply•Share › Avatar pinroot tbarge1 • 2 hours ago And using the same flawed models to 'prove' it. • Reply•Share › Avatar Incredulous • 5 hours ago This article is so full of suppositions and contradictions, it is ridiculous to have published it! 2 • Reply•Share › Avatar We are stupid • 5 hours ago Give me a break. Experts opinion...HAHAHA. You can find an "expert" to tell you anything you want to hear. You can not tell me that these cars are worse then a Yukon, Suburban. Please stop with the scare tactics. So they sold 10 million cars and Robert Rhodes say death tolls "could go as high as hundreds", are you really serious? The first clue to what this guy thinks is he is from "Berkeley Earth Team" that is where I would go for an unbiased opinion........ The sky is falling..... Are we really this stupid??? What is the death toll from exposure to the sun???? Skin cancer? 2 • Reply•Share › Avatar Paul We are stupid • 5 hours ago I am sure a bunch in the low information crowd will believe that VW has killed people. There will be NO reporting on how ridiculous this story is. 2 • Reply•Share › Avatar Old pump guy We are stupid • 4 hours ago Well, your points are well taken that WE ARE NOT STUPID. The point you make about a diesel Yukon or Suburban are also valid.The EPA standards are based on the weight of the vehicle and allows for larger/heavier trucks, SUVS, buses, Medium and Heavy duty trucks to "spew" even more NOX. Also, gasoline cars, home heating plants, commercial fuel oil usage....all produce NOX. So, what is the limit for a vehicle in the VW diesel weight range? From looking at the EPA regulations, I think it is 30 mg/mile. Therefore 10x the limit is 300 mg/mile or about twice what a Yukon is allowed and much less than a single Peterbuilt heavy truck. So, how do we take this level of "Spewing" and pin 16 to 94 deaths on VWs that are cleaner than ALL heavy duty trucks on our super highways. Next time you take a drive on an Interstate, compare how many heavy trucks you see to how many VWs (gas or diesel) you see.
VW was wrong to cheat but they are NOT killing 16 to 94 people a year with the excess NOX they "spew"! • Reply•
Did they subtract those of the 16 to 94 that would have died of something else?
How many had cancer?
How many would have offed themselves because they hated life?
How many would have died in a collision with a driverless google car? with a Prius?
How many would have been victims of a drive-by?
How many lived in Chicago?
More EPA nonsense
It’s a fabricated number, therefore you can’t argue against it. Do you have proof that people didn’t die from the emissions? #LibSpeak
If they want to go down this road, we can point to deaths attributable to lighter materials used to manufacture cars via CAFE standards.
How many died over the same period of infected ingrown toenails?
"I don't know the facts but I can say that VW acted stupidly"
VW is the next rich target that is going to fund, to the tune of $10 billion or more, bankrupt state bureaucracies and leftist walking-around money.
The ground is being prepared now.
If they can’t name them, it didn’t happen.
They can write stuff like this because we haven’t had a plague, epidemic, pandemic or war in so long that we no longer have a clear picture of what danger looks like.
When my mother, born in 1918, a huge number of children died from childhood diseases. Simple accidents caused infection and people died. Everybody knew somebody who died of something that today would be cured by a quick trip to the doc-ina-box. Even people living in the 1960’s would have laughed at the concerns of today. Most people living today have hardly seen death, and then only in the hospital and to the very old. It’s all about perspective.
So any time someone drives a vehicle that is out of tune, or intentionally altered, or an antique vehicle is guilty of murder?
The more significant air pollution threat is all the exhaust from tractor-trailer trucks and diesel-electric locomotives, many of which built before the 1990's don't come anywhere close to meeting EPA emission standards for trucks and diesel-electric locomotives. That's why modern tractor-trailer trucks have diesel engines with big diesel particulate filters and selective catalytic reduction (SCR) systems, and the latest diesel-electric locomotives have similar systems (like the newest version of the GE Evolution ES44DC locomotive that just started production this year).
“Mrs. Edith Schmaltz of Sheboygan, come on down!”
Heck yeah they did! The dang VW moguls are responsible for my aching prostate too. I demand money.
Nonsense! Tractor-trailer trucks have no emission standards, and belch a great deal of crud into the atmosphere. All of the VWs are a drop in the bucket by comparison.
What were their names?
From 2007 to 2014, life expectancy increased from 77.34 to 79 in the USA. That proves that VW’s increased diesel emissions caused more people to live longer.
Not to mention all the horny speckled salamanders that died.
Why does VW hate little baby Jesus?
In other news, 50,000,000 have perished due to abortions in the U.S.
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