Diesels make up about half of Europe's car sales. In 10 years time, I'd wager the percentage will be far closer to zero and that diesel's demise is going to cost the autos industry billions.

In Britain, the government is toying with the idea of a diesel scrappage plan to tackle the nitrogen oxide (NOx) emissions that kill about 75,000 Europeans prematurely each year.

EUROPEAN NOX-RELATED DEATHS EACH YEAR

75,000

It’s the latest in a succession of European measures which could see diesel cars barred from cities, their fuel incentives removed and parking made more expensive. Last month London issued a “black" alert because of high air pollution, prompting one school to restrict the time kids were able to play outside. Diesel is becoming stigmatized: sales have started to decline in the U.K. and Germany, albeit slowly.  

Diesel Downer

Diesel sales in Germany have fallen as a percentage of total vehicles sold

Last month, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV became the latest automaker to be accused by the U.S. of violating pollution laws over its diesel emissions. Meanwhile, France has referred Peugeot and Renault to prosecutors. Elzbieta Bienkowska, the EU industry commissioner overseeing the VW scandal told the Financial Times that her patience was wearing thin with national regulators over their lack of haste in examining carmakers other than VW.

VW's rivals all deny wrongdoing, and it's possible none has broken the law. "Existing models comply with the EU law against which they were approved," the European Automobile Manufacturers' Association (ACEA) says of the large discrepancies between laboratory and real-world emissions.  

But given the deaths from disease linked to air pollution, it seems a little arcane to be arguing about whether technology that -- for example -- switches off NOx emission controls at low temperature fits the legal definition of a "defeat device". At the very least, carmakers have done a poor job of explaining that diesel cars are much dirtier than the public had reason to expect.

David Fuller's view

The emissions discrepancies of automobile companies were outrageous, and a number of them have been fined.  Many others will suffer financially because they are holding billions of euros in diesel vehicles for which the market is rapidly vanishing.  However, the bigger scandal was the push by European governments and their advisors to favour diesel vehicles.  They did this in spite of evidence from the USA that NOx pollution from diesel was lethal.