:00:07. > :00:15.Britain is hooked on diesel. Half of our new cars guzzle it. The German
:00:16. > :00:23.motor giant Volkswagen is a market leader. Look watching is doing.
:00:24. > :00:30.Their cars promised owners they were doing their bit for the planet. I
:00:31. > :00:36.felt as though we had been duped by one of the largest companies in the
:00:37. > :00:41.world. VW was fooling everyone, a clever scam to beat the emissions
:00:42. > :00:47.test. It is difficult for me to explain what is happening and why.
:00:48. > :00:53.Tonight, panorama reveals for the first time how VW conned the
:00:54. > :00:55.European pollution testers. I think we have been testing the wrong
:00:56. > :01:01.things in the wrong way for quite a while. And we ask if they are the
:01:02. > :01:07.only manufacturer whose diesel fumes are ruining the end we breathe. You
:01:08. > :01:28.can't gasp for air because the air is what is hurting you.
:01:29. > :01:37.Europe is the world leader in diesel technology. Modern diesels are
:01:38. > :01:43.quick, quiet, reliable, and often more economic than petrol cars. Over
:01:44. > :01:49.the last decade or so, they have become a firm favourite. Diesels
:01:50. > :01:55.seem like such a success story, until eight weeks ago, when VW was
:01:56. > :01:59.forced to admit that for years it had been cheating the American
:02:00. > :02:05.emissions test. It had programmed the cars' computer with a defeat
:02:06. > :02:09.device, so the car was clean in the laboratory, but on the road, the
:02:10. > :02:14.pollution levels shot up, as much as 40 times the legal limit. Cheating
:02:15. > :02:20.was the only way the company could pass this test and have a car that
:02:21. > :02:26.performed well on the road. How do you like my new car? In July,
:02:27. > :02:31.Volkswagen became the world's biggest car-maker. It adverts
:02:32. > :02:41.trumpeted how squeaky clean they were. Diesel in Latin means dirty.
:02:42. > :02:46.You are going to ruin your scarf! See how clean it is? That is why
:02:47. > :02:52.Volkswagen is the number-1 selling diesel in America. It was an
:02:53. > :02:58.illusion, the boss of the American business admitted they had been
:02:59. > :03:06.lying for years. Our company was dishonest. With the EPA and the
:03:07. > :03:11.California Air Resources Board and with all of you. In my German
:03:12. > :03:17.words, we have totally screwed up. They announced 11 million cars from
:03:18. > :03:22.the group, which includes Audi, Seat and Skoda, where programmed with the
:03:23. > :03:30.cheating software. That includes 1.2 million cars in the UK. I have come
:03:31. > :03:35.to Northamptonshire to meet this family. You can see why they needed
:03:36. > :03:46.a bigger car. As well as Baxter the dog, they have two kids. Mark and
:03:47. > :03:49.Claire paid ?15,500 for their BlueMotion Volkswagen Passat. They
:03:50. > :03:57.wanted something reliable, safe and clean. Volkswagen were quite keen to
:03:58. > :04:04.push the environmental credentials of their vehicle. The BlueMotion
:04:05. > :04:06.technology was definitely a factor in highlighting this vehicle is one
:04:07. > :04:13.that we would be interested in, definitely. We looked at other
:04:14. > :04:19.options, hybrids, because when you have a family, you start thinking a
:04:20. > :04:22.bit more about the impact that you have on the environment, you look at
:04:23. > :04:31.the next best option that ticks all the boxes and does what you need it
:04:32. > :04:36.to do. It was part of it. It was one of many factors that led us to
:04:37. > :04:42.purchase this vehicle. You have bought your car, you are driving it
:04:43. > :04:51.around, you have assumptions about it, then you see the VW story, what
:04:52. > :04:58.did you think? I was shocked. At first, I felt stupid. I felt as
:04:59. > :05:06.though the wall had been pulled over my eyes, and been told a lie. Once I
:05:07. > :05:15.got over that and realise that I was not stupid, I felt really angry
:05:16. > :05:21.about it. With so many angry customers, I wanted to understand
:05:22. > :05:27.what the defeat device was and where it might be hidden. There has been a
:05:28. > :05:33.revolution in car technology in the last 20 years. Now, all modern cars
:05:34. > :05:40.are controlled by computer, so that is where we started. Scott, you can
:05:41. > :05:50.take this computer out? Yes. Let's go. We have got the ECU. How
:05:51. > :05:58.important is that in a modern car? Very important. They control
:05:59. > :06:07.everything in the car. Headlights, wipers, door locks, indicators, ...
:06:08. > :06:13.This is the brain of the car, it is where scientists believe the cheat
:06:14. > :06:19.device is lurking. That is the PPF filter. It has a load of sensors on
:06:20. > :06:24.there, it controls what is going out into the atmosphere. One function of
:06:25. > :06:28.the computer is that it decides what pollution is going to come out of
:06:29. > :06:38.the exhaust pipe. Yes, what is going in and out. There we have it. The
:06:39. > :06:46.biggest brain of the car. That is it, the on-board computer. Somewhere
:06:47. > :06:57.in here is the software, the defeat device. That has caused this huge
:06:58. > :07:06.scandal. To understand how VW's device works, we entered the
:07:07. > :07:11.secretive world of car testing. No British laboratory would help, so we
:07:12. > :07:16.went to this facility in the Czech Republic. It is governed by the same
:07:17. > :07:22.EU rules and regulations as the UK. We put a Passat BlueMotion through
:07:23. > :07:29.its paces to reveal how the car's computer fix its green credentials.
:07:30. > :07:33.The clues will lie in the cocktail of emissions coming from the
:07:34. > :07:40.exhaust. It is a 2014 car, we are testing it against the euro five
:07:41. > :07:44.emission limit, 180 mg of nitrogen oxide per kilometre, the polluting
:07:45. > :07:56.gases that are the most damaging to human health. The scientist guiding
:07:57. > :08:03.us is Michal Vojtisek, he spent the last 15 years studying diesel
:08:04. > :08:10.engines. To referee the whole thing, we brought Ted Foreman, a retired UK
:08:11. > :08:22.Government vehicle inspector. His job is to make sure we do everything
:08:23. > :08:28.by the book. 2.4. Yes. OK. What are you looking for? We are going to
:08:29. > :08:31.make sure the tyres are inflated to the recommendation of the
:08:32. > :08:36.manufacturer, so the resistance is not giving us any spurious resorts,
:08:37. > :08:41.and we will make sure they use the right coefficients from the
:08:42. > :08:48.legislation. The rule book runs to 280 pages. One of the hundreds of
:08:49. > :08:53.conditions states the car has to stand in doors for at least six
:08:54. > :08:56.hours to cool to room temperature. This is meant to make the test
:08:57. > :09:09.tougher, as cold engines often pollute more. Do we have the cell
:09:10. > :09:18.temperature? Excellent. 24.3, it is right in the middle, it is right.
:09:19. > :09:23.The procedure is so predictable, the suspicion is that the car's computer
:09:24. > :09:27.can instantly work out if it is being tested and cut the pollution
:09:28. > :09:31.coming from the exhaust. When was the last time you got in a car and
:09:32. > :09:38.drove in a straight line from a cold start for six miles without turning
:09:39. > :09:42.the steering wheel? It is driving by numbers, so controlled, it is
:09:43. > :09:49.robotic. The displayed it takes the pace. Street just two kilometres an
:09:50. > :09:57.hour over or under and the test is potentially void. You have the drive
:09:58. > :10:01.cycle, the line in green, and the driver is following it. The purple
:10:02. > :10:09.lines of the upper and lower limit, the violation. They can make the
:10:10. > :10:14.test in valid. He is following the drive cycle really well. Parts of
:10:15. > :10:17.the test have not changed for 40 years. It always takes 20 minutes
:10:18. > :10:33.and 20 seconds, precisely. We played it by the book and the
:10:34. > :10:40.eco-friendly BlueMotion Passat past the emissions test. We have done one
:10:41. > :10:46.test with the computer plugged into your systems, the emissions levels
:10:47. > :10:52.were fine. Yes, now we run another test. The professor now have the car
:10:53. > :10:57.driven at high speed, well above the normal test range. He was trying to
:10:58. > :11:02.convince the on-board computer that the car was no longer in the
:11:03. > :11:12.laboratory. We are looking if the engine will return itself to a test
:11:13. > :11:16.mode or good emission behaviour. In effect, you are trying to find
:11:17. > :11:20.little ways of putting it in test mode and outside test mode, just to
:11:21. > :11:26.see if there is any difference? Yes. We repeated the same emissions
:11:27. > :11:30.test drive, with one key difference, we started with a hot
:11:31. > :11:37.engine. The amount of poisonous gases in the exhaust was measured.
:11:38. > :11:43.Look at the emissions now. They are becoming very high. It is difficult
:11:44. > :11:51.for me to explain what is happening and why. It failed, spectacularly.
:11:52. > :11:55.When the on-board computer thinks it is not being tested, it stops
:11:56. > :11:59.cheating, it runs the engine as if it were on the road, pumping out two
:12:00. > :12:06.and a half times more poisonous gases. We have shown for the first
:12:07. > :12:14.time that the on-board computer can cheat the European emissions test as
:12:15. > :12:51.well as the American one. Volkswagen told us...
:12:52. > :12:58.Our experiment goes some way to answer a problem that had puzzled
:12:59. > :13:01.environmental scientists for years. Despite tougher regulations to
:13:02. > :13:08.reduce emissions, the amount of poisonous nitrogen dioxide remains
:13:09. > :13:12.stubbornly high. Latest research shows that pollution in London
:13:13. > :13:18.during the rush hour often peaks at dangerous levels. Many other UK
:13:19. > :13:24.cities also struggle to meet EU clean air targets. Our measurements
:13:25. > :13:29.from the London air quality network show that it was not changing, so we
:13:30. > :13:35.went and looked at the data Neil Rhodes and we found that it was
:13:36. > :13:39.diesel vehicles which were emitting a lot more pollutants than they
:13:40. > :13:44.should be. We now have cities which are clogged full of traffic which
:13:45. > :13:49.are producing a lot of emissions, much more than we thought they were,
:13:50. > :13:56.and that has led to this ten, 15 years of people breathing into much
:13:57. > :14:01.air pollution. The air we breathe now is partly down to a decision
:14:02. > :14:06.made here, 14 years ago. Back then, cutting the greenhouse gas carbon
:14:07. > :14:11.dioxide was the political priority, and petrol engines made more of it,
:14:12. > :14:15.so the Government offered tax breaks to encourage drivers to change over
:14:16. > :14:21.to diesel. In fact, they were swapping one polluting menace for
:14:22. > :14:26.another. Ben Barratt is a scientist at Kings College, London, an expert
:14:27. > :14:30.in air pollution. People show is a ground-breaking experiment that
:14:31. > :14:36.measured the diesel pollution in London and its effects on our
:14:37. > :14:38.bodies. If you can talk me through what we are going to do? You will
:14:39. > :14:55.have to take some clothes off! You haven't picked the warmest day!
:14:56. > :14:59.I will trust you. What are we doing? These will be connected up to an
:15:00. > :15:02.ECG, which monitors your heart rate. That tells us about how the
:15:03. > :15:07.different areas of your heart are reacting to the air you are
:15:08. > :15:11.breathing. The idea was simple. Monitor people first in a quiet
:15:12. > :15:16.park, and then on one of the country's most polluted roads.
:15:17. > :15:23.Basically, this snuck up on us, because we thought we had sorted
:15:24. > :15:26.this in the 90s. We did. The catalytic converters and other
:15:27. > :15:29.technology made a big difference, so we were not expecting vehicle
:15:30. > :15:38.pollution to be as much of an issue as it is today. Mind the Swans! I
:15:39. > :15:42.can see my heart rate going on the monitor. So, we have had a lovely
:15:43. > :15:48.walk in the bucolic park. Now it is time for the real world.
:15:49. > :15:51.Oxford Street is diesel central, with traffic limited to buses and
:15:52. > :16:01.cards. It has recorded some of the highest levels of an -- NO2 in the
:16:02. > :16:05.world. A walk of just a few hundred yards, and Ben's kit shows that the
:16:06. > :16:10.pollution more than doubles and my heart rate climbs. How do you think
:16:11. > :16:14.this research has changed people's perceptions? It changed something
:16:15. > :16:18.that was an environmental issue into a health issue. So basically, not
:16:19. > :16:22.every one cares about the environment, but we care about our
:16:23. > :16:26.health? We care about ourselves and our family, that is the bottom line.
:16:27. > :16:32.What were your official long-term findings? With the asthmatics, their
:16:33. > :16:36.lungs became inflamed and their lung capacity decreased. There is a
:16:37. > :16:40.evidence that healthy individuals, when walking along Oxford Street,
:16:41. > :16:44.did not get the health benefits of exercise that they should. So
:16:45. > :16:48.everybody is affected? Well, you have to remember that this is an
:16:49. > :16:55.extreme case and some of the highest levels of nitrogen dioxide levels in
:16:56. > :17:00.Europe are recorded on this street. Pollution attacks all of us, but it
:17:01. > :17:06.is the young, the old and the sick who are the most vulnerable.
:17:07. > :17:11.Children like 16-year-old Sophie Hyde are regularly admitted for long
:17:12. > :17:15.stays at the country's leading lung hospital. They YouTuber, she was
:17:16. > :17:22.excited to have something new to report. This is a lot different than
:17:23. > :17:27.normal. I have a camera crew from BBC Panorama. Richard stole my
:17:28. > :17:34.crisps! Then we have guests. Sophie was born with the lung disease
:17:35. > :17:37.cystic fibrosis. So you live by a beach, but you have to come into the
:17:38. > :17:41.city for treatment. What is the difference between those two
:17:42. > :17:46.environments? Can you feel the difference inside your lungs? With
:17:47. > :17:50.the pollution, you feel like you are drowning in smoke. You feel like you
:17:51. > :17:54.are tried to gasp for air, but you can't because the air around you is
:17:55. > :17:59.what is hurting you. And it is really annoying. You can't breathe
:18:00. > :18:04.as easily as you can in the countryside, with hardly any cars.
:18:05. > :18:09.My friends catch the train and go into town and they can rush about
:18:10. > :18:13.the shops. If I come, I feel like I am slowing them down. I feel a bit
:18:14. > :18:19.of a burden to them, because I can't breathe as easily as I can where I
:18:20. > :18:23.normally live. So it puts you off going into towns? Yeah, because I
:18:24. > :18:28.get scared that I will have an episode and I have to take my and
:18:29. > :18:34.everything. It is sort of embarrassing. -- I will have to take
:18:35. > :18:38.my inhalers. Having watched Sophie struggle to breathe, I went to see
:18:39. > :18:42.Professor Andrew Bush, head of the department that looks after her. I
:18:43. > :18:48.was shocked to find that heavy traffic pollution even targets
:18:49. > :18:52.children yet to be born. If your mother is exposed to environmental
:18:53. > :18:57.pollution in pregnancy, this will affect the child's lung function at
:18:58. > :19:01.age four to five years. We also have known for many years that
:19:02. > :19:06.environmental pollution is associated with poor lung growth in
:19:07. > :19:09.childhood. Big groups of children living in a heavily polluted area
:19:10. > :19:17.will have less good lung function than a big room of children living
:19:18. > :19:22.in a non-polluted area. Professor Bush says pollution could be harming
:19:23. > :19:31.one in ten children living in big cities, and the damage lasts a
:19:32. > :19:34.lifetime. One emissions testing company told us that of the 16
:19:35. > :19:40.newest cars they have examined, just four were as keen on real roads as
:19:41. > :19:48.they were in the lab. It begs the question, how many dirty engines are
:19:49. > :19:52.out there? We decided to test a different make of car at our
:19:53. > :20:00.independent lab in Prague. A people carrier this time, a 1.6 diesel
:20:01. > :20:08.Zafira, the eco-model. The badge says Opel, but it's the same as a
:20:09. > :20:10.Vauxhall. Why this car? Other tests by a German environmental group
:20:11. > :20:17.suggested that it behaved oddly in the lab, all strenuously denied by
:20:18. > :20:28.the manufacturer. After leaving the car to cool overnight, we put it to
:20:29. > :20:34.the test. It is 2015 registered, so faces a tough Euro 6 emissions
:20:35. > :20:40.standard, with a limit of just 80 mg of NOx gases per kilometre. Again,
:20:41. > :20:45.Ted is on hand to make sure we follow the letter of the law. The
:20:46. > :20:49.legislation says you should be able to take any car in reasonable
:20:50. > :20:55.condition, taken to the lab, put it through the taxed and it should
:20:56. > :21:05.pass. This Zafira has just failed. At twice the Euro 6 knocks limit, it
:21:06. > :21:10.wasn't even close. Once again, we tried something that isn't in the
:21:11. > :21:17.test, a cruise at motorway speeds. Look at the Spike. Ted, you are the
:21:18. > :21:21.testing expert. What do you make of the results we have seen? It is
:21:22. > :21:26.surprising to me, because I have only ever done the type of approval
:21:27. > :21:30.test where things comply. It is new to me to see it taken outside its
:21:31. > :21:39.comfort zone, for want of a better expression. When we went even
:21:40. > :21:47.faster, as if overtaking on a motorway, the emissions went off the
:21:48. > :21:51.scale, literally. At approximately 135 kilometres per hour, we have
:21:52. > :21:56.seen the NOx emissions increase. They are above the measuring range
:21:57. > :22:03.of the instrument. But that just be because the car is going faster and
:22:04. > :22:06.therefore emits more? When the car is running faster, the engine is
:22:07. > :22:12.working harder and you get higher fuel consumption, so you get higher
:22:13. > :22:19.emissions. But there is no reason for the emissions to be up to ten
:22:20. > :22:24.times higher. Then we ran a second standard emissions test, again, with
:22:25. > :22:31.just one difference. The engine was hot. In theory, that should make it
:22:32. > :22:39.less polluting. The result was even worse than a cold engine. It was 3.5
:22:40. > :22:44.times the Euro 6 limit. What we have seen here is a twofold to threefold
:22:45. > :22:50.difference arm and for that, I do not have a good explanation. It goes
:22:51. > :22:57.beyond what could easily be explained by engineering reasons.
:22:58. > :23:07.So, an eco-car, good as new, failing the lab test. How many others out
:23:08. > :23:11.there would do the same? For Ted, who spent a career in forcing a test
:23:12. > :23:18.that he thought was protecting our health, the implications are hard to
:23:19. > :23:21.swallow. How do you feel? A bit disillusioned, really. My conclusion
:23:22. > :23:26.going away from here is that we have been testing the wrong things in the
:23:27. > :23:29.wrong way for quite a while. Vauxhall cult panorama that the
:23:30. > :23:54.Zafira has no defeat device and said:
:23:55. > :24:11.As to the high-speed cruising simulation, the company said:
:24:12. > :24:16.Diesel engines are the new environmental villains, and the
:24:17. > :24:23.impact of the smallest particles they produce is not yet fully
:24:24. > :24:26.understood. These tiny, ultrafine particles are produced in their
:24:27. > :24:29.billions with every acceleration of a diesel vehicle. These particles
:24:30. > :24:34.have never been on the planet before. They are a new type of
:24:35. > :24:38.challenge to our bodies. Modelling by Birmingham University shows that
:24:39. > :24:42.a cocktail of nitrogen dioxide and tiny particles is trapped between
:24:43. > :24:47.the buildings. The pollution is worst where people are walking.
:24:48. > :24:53.Scientists have only just started to focus on the health effects of these
:24:54. > :24:59.ultrafine specks. What do we know about these very small particles? In
:25:00. > :25:03.terms of health effects, they are easily inhaled. They will deposit in
:25:04. > :25:06.the deepest lung, and there is evidence that they can penetrate
:25:07. > :25:10.through biological membranes and even into cells within the body.
:25:11. > :25:13.Then they can affect the bloodstream, and that is where we
:25:14. > :25:21.believe they can cause clotting in the blood, leading to heart attacks
:25:22. > :25:26.and other effects on health. So as I am walking along, there are billions
:25:27. > :25:31.of particles going into my lungs? 30 billion in an hour. 30 billion
:25:32. > :25:39.particles in an hour going into my lungs as I walk along a busy road.
:25:40. > :25:45.VW promises to fix all its cars by the end of 2016. But they are
:25:46. > :25:51.struggling to rebuild trust, and now customers like Mark and Claire want
:25:52. > :25:55.compensation. Volkswagens are now before holding their value well, and
:25:56. > :26:00.that was a factor in making us choose this car. If this car
:26:01. > :26:04.suddenly loses 20% of its value overnight because people cannot
:26:05. > :26:12.trust how it performs... It puts people off. Then I want that money
:26:13. > :26:15.back! I'm sorry, I do. Volkswagen used its green credentials to sell
:26:16. > :26:20.10 million cars a year under eight different brand names, but now
:26:21. > :26:24.global sales are falling. The company has offered an amnesty to
:26:25. > :26:28.any whistle-blower with information on the development of the defeat
:26:29. > :26:35.device. And the compensation lawyers are circling. We have four types of
:26:36. > :26:40.actions which could be brought - consumer fraud actions, people who
:26:41. > :26:43.have bought diesel cars with the defeat device, disgruntled
:26:44. > :26:47.Volkswagen shareholders who have purchased shares, actions brought by
:26:48. > :26:50.people who have been affected by excessive nitrogen oxide emissions,
:26:51. > :26:55.and potentially even actions brought by car manufacturers who have lost
:26:56. > :27:00.sales as a result of an aggressive marketing campaign by Volkswagen in
:27:01. > :27:03.relation to their diesel cars. Is impossible to pin down exactly what
:27:04. > :27:09.this might cost the company in the end? We have 11 million Volkswagen
:27:10. > :27:12.diesel cars worldwide with the defeat device. The cost of repairing
:27:13. > :27:18.those, putting in the fix and making sure they reach the promises which
:27:19. > :27:23.were made even if that is $1000 per car, that is immediately $11
:27:24. > :27:26.billion. On top of that, you have an action, for instance, brought by or
:27:27. > :27:31.intended to be brought forward by Volkswagen shareholders. They are
:27:32. > :27:41.claiming 40 billion euros by way of damages. VW's reputation has been
:27:42. > :27:47.wrecked. It remains to be seen what they can save from the pieces. The
:27:48. > :27:51.laws and tests designed to keep diesel cars clean are clearly
:27:52. > :27:57.failing, and the result is a health time bomb. We need to have
:27:58. > :28:02.legislation. The car manufacturers will not do it unless they are made
:28:03. > :28:10.to do it. We need legislation to protect our children's lungs. That
:28:11. > :28:16.is my view. I am at the beach at the moment and it is really nice and the
:28:17. > :28:21.waves are hitting. The air is so fresh, and I can finally breathe
:28:22. > :28:33.again compared to London. It's really nice. So yeah, bye!