Diesel

Since at least 2010, the European Commission has been in possession of concrete evidence that automobile manufacturers were cheating on emissions values of diesel vehicles, according to a number of internal documents that SPIEGEL ONLINE has obtained. The papers show that emissions cheating had been under discussion for years both within the Commission and the EU member state governments. The documents also show that the German government was informed of a 2012 meeting on the issue.

The records provide a rough chronology of the scandal, which reaches back to the middle of the 2000s.
Back then, European Commission experts noticed an odd phenomenon: Air quality in European cities was improving much more slowly than was to be expected in light of stricter emissions regulations. The Commission charged the Joint Research Centre (JRC) -- an organization that carries out studies on behalf of the Commission.

The initial results were published in a journal in 2008 and they came to the attention of the Commission.
On Oct. 8, 2010 -- roughly three years after the JRC tests -- an internal memo noted that it was "well known" that there was a discrepancy between diesel vehicle emissions during the type approval stage (when new vehicle models are approved for use on European roads) and real-world driving conditions. The document also makes the origin of this discrepancy clear: It is the product of "an extended use of certain abatement technologies in diesel vehicles."  SPIEGEL