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Volkswagen will have to make massive savings to cope with the huge cost of its emissions cheating scandal. That was the stark message delivered to more than 20,000 Volkswagen employees by the group's new chief executive, Matthias Mueller, at a meeting in Germany on Tuesday. A former Porsche chief, Mueller took over as CEO of the giant automaker after Martin Winterkorn stood down when it became clear the group had cheated emissions tests on as many as 11 million diesel vehicles worldwide. Mueller said Volkswagen would survive, but warned the road to recovery would be painful. "We must make massive...

Two top Volkswagen engineers who found they couldn’t deliver as promised a clean diesel engine for the U.S. market are at the center of a company probe into the installation of engine software designed to fool regulators, according to people familiar with the matter. The two men, Ulrich Hackenberg, Audi ’s chief engineer, and Wolfgang Hatz, developer of Porsche’s Formula One and Le Mans racing engines, were among the engineers suspended in the investigation of the emissions cheating scandal that sank the company’s market value by 43% since Sept. 18 and triggered a world-wide recall to refit the engines to...

WOLFSBURG, Germany—Two top Volkswagen engineers who found they couldn’t deliver as promised a clean diesel engine for the U.S. market are at the center of a company probe into the installation of engine software designed to fool regulators, according to people familiar with the matter. The two men, Ulrich Hackenberg, Audi ’s chief engineer, and Wolfgang Hatz, developer of Porsche’s winning Formula One engines, were among the engineers suspended in the investigation of the emissions cheating scandal that sank the company’s market value by 43% since Sept. 18 and triggered a world-wide recall to refit the engines to meet clear-air...

The Obama administration on Friday directed Volkswagen to recall nearly a half-million cars, saying the automaker illegally installed software in its diesel-power cars to evade standards for reducing smog. The Environmental Protection Agency accused the German automaker of using software to detect when the car is undergoing its periodic state emissions testing. Only during such tests are the cars’ full emissions control systems turned on. During normal driving situations, the controls are turned off, allowing the cars to spew as much as 40 times as much pollution as allowed under the Clean Air Act, the E.P.A. said. “We expected better...

FRANKFURT — Martin Winterkorn resigned as chief executive of Volkswagen Wednesday, taking responsibility for an emissions cheating scandal that has gravely damaged the carmaker’s reputation and may spread to the German economy. “As C.E.O. I accept responsibility for the irregularities that have been found in diesel engines,” Mr. Winterkorn, who had headed the company since 2007, said in a statement. But he continued to insist he personally committed no misconduct. “I am not aware of any wrong doing on my part.”

BERLIN— Volkswagen AG Chief Executive Martin Winterkorn resigned Wednesday in the wake of a developing emissions scandal that has stunned the auto industry and slashed the car maker’s market value. “Volkswagen needs a fresh start—also in terms of personnel,” Mr. Winterkorn said. “I am clearing the way for this fresh start with my resignation.” Mr. Winterkorn said that he accepted responsibility for the irregularities found in diesel engines and has asked the supervisory board to agree to his stepping down. He said, however, that he wasn't aware of any wrongdoing on his part.

There are so many minor stories that are embarrassing to liberals to blog about this afternoon, it’s hard to choose just one. Should I blog the fact that gutless Hillary Clinton waited for the Pope’s arrival to dump the news that she’s taking the predictable orthodox left-wing position on the Keystone Pipeline? Should I blog about left-wing writers being so stupid that they don’t realize the word “retarded” has a non-slur definition? Or should I blog the fact that America’s been planning the Pope’s visit for months and somehow Obama still couldn’t quite get to the airport on time? When...

The Heartland Institute published a very revealing article about Leftist shock jock Naomi Klein who just published a new anti-capitalst screed entitled This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate. Essentially, Ms. Klein admits that the issue of climate change (formerly known as global warming) is not about science but really about overthrowing capitalism. “Our economic model is at war with the Earth,” writes Klein. “We cannot change the laws of nature. But we can change our economy. Climate change is our best chance to demand and build a better world.” The Heartland article goes on to say: For the author,...

President Obama is surreptitiously colluding with radical anti-growth environmentalists to force ideologically driven carbon-emission controls on the energy industry that will devastate the U.S. economy, congressional investigators have discovered. As the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) drew up rules aimed at limiting carbon emissions from power-generation plants, "key stakeholders — including the American public — had little to no influence over the debate while powerful environmental activist groups were given unprecedented access to and influence over administration officials," the Washington Times reported yesterday. Collusion between the EPA and the green's isn't exactly breaking news. They've been doing it for years, but...

Obama to mandate steeper emissions cuts from U.S. Power Plants The expansion of the federal government, and more specifically the expansion of the executive branch, has been the daunting storyline of the Barack Obama administration, be it taking control of the auto industry; inserting heavy federal regulations on the banking and credit industries; hijacking the health care industry with Obamacare (and modifying the law through executive orders when legislative authorities belongs to Congress); gun control measures; seizing control of the internet through an expansive reach of the FCC; declaring its own definition of marriage through a Supreme Court judicial ruling;...

The EPA may be making some major changes to its carbon dioxide emissions regulatory scheme, the details of which have been leaked to the media just days ahead of its expected release date. The EPA will be getting rid of its energy efficiency building block of its Clean Power Plan over legal concerns the agency was overstepping its bounds by controlling how efficiently people used their electricity, reports The Wall Street Journal. The Journal also reported the Clean Power Plan will encourage nuclear power production. An EPA spokeswoman would not confirm the reported changes to the rule as it has...

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker has signaled in a letter to President Obama that his state might not comply with a forthcoming rule limiting carbon emissions from power plants. The likely GOP presidential candidate told Obama in the May 21 letter that he has "deep concerns regarding our ability to develop a state plan to comply with" the proposed Environmental Protection Agency targets. The implicit threat makes Walker the highest-profile governor to consider endorsing Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's strategy of undercutting the regulation through states refusing to submit a compliance plan, though he ultimately stopped short of doing so. "The...

Governor Jerry Brown issued an executive order to bring down emissions to 40% below 1990 levels, in the next 15 years. The US state was already one of the most ambitious in its previous targets and has forced companies to pay for their carbon pollution. Mr Brown said the new target must be met for the sake of future generations. He called the plan "the most aggressive benchmark enacted by any government in North America to reduce dangerous carbon emissions". There were few details about how he intends to meet this target, but the governor has previously talked about increasing...

OSLO, April 13 (Reuters) - China is poised to overtake the United States as the main cause of man-made global warming since 1990, the benchmark year for U.N.-led action, in a historic shift that may raise pressure on Beijing to act. China's cumulative greenhouse gas emissions since 1990, when governments were becoming aware of climate change, will outstrip those of the United States in 2015 or 2016, according to separate estimates by experts in Norway and the United States. The shift, reflecting China's stellar economic growth, raises questions about historical blame for rising temperatures and more floods, desertification, heatwaves and...

Climate Change: President Obama's proposal to cut U.S. emissions by 28% over 10 years as America's contribution to a global climate treaty will devastate our economy while doing nothing to reduce temperatures. The "Clean Power Plan" that the Obama administration submitted Tuesday to the United Nations Framework on Climate Change met an end-of-March deadline for contributions to a treaty in the final stages of negotiations. But the proposal, known to climate negotiators as an Intended Nationally Determined Contribution, isn't new. Obama announced the goal of reducing emissions by 28% below 2005 levels by 2025 as part of a joint climate...

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama is directing the federal government to cut its emissions of heat-trapping gases blamed for global warming. Obama will sign an executive order targeting greenhouse gases at the White House on Thursday. The White House says a number of major companies that sell to the federal government will also announce commitments to cut their emissions.

Full title: Carbon dioxide emissions help tropical rainforests grow faster: Study shows trees absorb more greenhouse gas than expected Tropical forests are growing faster than scientists thought due to rising levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. A Nasa-led study has found that tropical forests are absorbing 1.5 billion tons of carbon dioxide every year as they photosynthesise and grow. And this is far more than is absorbed by the vast areas of boreal forest that encircle the Arctic. As emissions add more carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, forests worldwide are using it to grow faster.

The Supreme Court on Monday mostly validated the Environmental Protection Agency’s plans to regulate power plant and factory emissions of greenhouse gases blamed for global warming, while imposing some limits on the agency’s reach. The justices said the EPA could not rewrite specific standards written into the law, but they still handed the Obama administration and environmentalists a big victory by agreeing there was another way for the EPA to carry out its program.

For people who use the word “science” as a bludgeon and trumpet their strict commitment to fact and reason, the Obama administration and its supporters are strangely incapable of rational analysis of new climate-change regulations. President Barack Obama’s Environmental Protection Agency released draft rules last week to create a vast new regulatory apparatus with no input from Congress — in other words, to govern in its accustomed highhanded, undemocratic manner. The goal is to reduce carbon emissions from existing power plants, in particular coal-fired plants, to 30 percent below 2005 levels by 2030. The rhetoric around the rules has involved...

emissions by nearly 41 percent over the next 15 years as part of a sweeping plan President Barack Obama announced Monday to reduce pollution from power plants. Obama's plan calls for a 30 percent reduction in carbon emissions nationwide by 2030, when compared with 2005 levels. It sets different goals for each state, and some that rely heavily on coal won't have to make as many reductions. Minnesota is one of nine states told to reduce their 2012 levels by more than 40 percent, to help meet the nation's overall reduction goal. Officials with the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, utilities...