Prosecutors are fining Daimler €870 million for neglecting its supervisory duties in connection with diesel emissions. Representatives of the German car giant say the company will not contest the order.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/P. Pleul
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On Tuesday, prosecutors in the southwestern city of Stuttgart said they would order the German automotive giant to pay an €870 million ($957 million) fine after tens of thousands of diesel vehicles breached emissions rules.
Prosecutors said they were penalizing the company for shirking its supervisory duties. Daimler representatives said they would not contest the measure.
"The company has refrained from taking a legal remedy against the fine notice" relating to "negligent violation of supervisory duties," Daimler announced in a statement.
The company boasted that the penalty "does not result in a relevant additional negative effect on earnings" from July to September.
According to the statement, Daimler officials had determined that concluding the proceedings would be "in the company's best interest."
Germany's national transport authority, the KBA, has flagged at least 684,000 vehicles for excessive emissions. The investigators "identified a negligent violation of supervisory duties in the Daimler unit that deals with vehicle certification beginning in 2008," according to prosecutors.
Stuttgart drops diesel while German cities dally
German environmentalists made waves by suing their cities over dirty air. Stuttgart is bringing in a diesel ban in April, but after appeals and strong resistance from lawmakers, where can you drive a diesel these days?
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/S. Gollnow
Car city Stuttgart - home to powerful auto makers Porsche and Daimler
From April 1 it will be illegal to drive diesel vehicles made before the Euro 5 standard was developed in 2009 in Stuttgart. This after an environmental group went to court to force the city into action. But 'yellow vest' styled protests have pushed back with class and economic arguments for three months. The city will decide whether to ban Euro 5 diesels after emissions tests in mid-2019.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/C. Schmidt
Hamburg - out in front
Hamburg became the first German city to introduce partial bans in June 2018, with two-thirds of its 300,000 diesels forced off two of its main roads. The city is one of about 80 in Germany where nitrogen oxide levels often surpass the European threshold of 40 micrograms per cubic meter. In February 2018 the top federal court cleared the way for state courts to impose bans to improve air quality.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/R. Schlesinger
Munich - Germany resists
Munich has relatively low pollution levels but lost in court to German environmentalists in 2017. It refused to implement the bans. After Dieselgate, the EU acted on Germany's lax controls, but much of the country is still resistant. Last year Chancellor Angela Merkel pushed the EU to allow a buffer of 10 micrograms in cities and promised to introduce laws protecting older diesel owners.
Image: Imago/M. Westermann
Cologne, Düsseldorf and Bonn - dodging diesel
With the dirtiest air in the densely populated state of NRW, Cologne was served with a court order last year but has appealed. The city has found ways to clean up its atmosphere through low emission buses, truck detours, traffic lights and cycling infrastructure. Nearby Düsseldorf has introduced 60 such measures to avoid the bans, while Bonn has appealed an order due to take effect in April
Berlin has until July to implement a clean air plan but drafts so far say 11 major streets will be closed to diesels up to Euro 5 standard. More than 100 roads will be limited to 30 km/h (18 mph). The city will also bring on 200 new double decker buses ―powered by diesel ― part of a broader investment in new public transport to battle air pollution.
Image: picture alliance/dpa/S. Jaitner
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As investigators continue to discover deviations from emissions standards, which were put in place to ensure cleaner air and slow the pace of global heating, the KBA has ordered waves of recalls of cars made by Daimler, the parent company of Mercedes-Benz.
The automaker has been forced to install thousands of more accurate versions of its emissions software into cars that had been sold across Europe.
In 2015, Volkswagen, another major German car producer, admitted that it had built emissions-cheating software into 11 million automobiles worldwide. VW officials have since been charged with manipulating markets by attempting to increase sales with cars that were marketed as greener than they were. Germans were shocked in 2018 to learn that automakers such as Volkswagen and Daimler had even tested the effects of the noxious diesel emissions on primates held captive in closed environments.
