Now, Lexus Fires Up Diesel Owners

It reminds me of the old saying,"a dozen 'atta boys are wiped out by one OH SH*T!"

Bob Wilson

 

[QUOTE The jetta tdi should be much lower in pollutants than the average car driven in southern California, but the prius probably releases cleaner air in LA than goes into the engine.[/QUOTE]

That's a funny thought, we need pruis that can run on normal LA air. they would be very inexpesive to drive as long as you follow some cars that don't burn the fuel very well. just get behind a ford v10, I have one and it uses plenty of fuel, should have plenty of power in your smog powerd prius

 

Guess I'm not following you. LEV II/Tier 2 doesn't combine NMOG/NMHC and NOx in the FTP like Tier 3/LEV III does. However, you can just add together the NMHC and NOx certification levels to come up with a NMHC+NOx FTP emission level in Tier 2/LEV II.

If you are having a problem with the US06 NMHC+ NOx emission levels of the 328d, then take a look at the certified emissions of the aforementioned X3 28d - http://www.arb.ca.gov/msprog/onroad/cert/pcldtmdv/2015/bmw_ldt_a0080368_2d0_u2_diesel.pdf. It's essentially the same engine used in the 328d, and I suspect BMW will combine the two into one cert for 2015 eventually. I haven't found an overall emission profile (taking FTP, US06 and SC03 certified emissions into account) certified under Tier 2/LEV II better than that.

 

you dont have to pass a new law, just use administrative directives like the president does.

 

Not my problem -- BMWs

The link you give here is for FTP - 75. The engine twin does pretty darn good on that cycle, at least for 50k miles. OTOH, the 328d has *much* higher emissions on the SC03 and US06 cycles. I earlier linked to a CARB discussion about proposed LEV III (published in 2010.) I found it very informative. It also has data from a subset of cars that looks at FTP vs SC03 vs US06 NOx and NMHC emissions. Surprising to me, most cars have *less* emissions on the higher load tests. I have no idea why this diesel is so different, or if it is a diesel characteristic. All that I can say for sure is that this car is nowhere close to SULEV by LEV III because of the SC03 and US06 requirements.

 

How does a non-hybrid PZEV car like a Subaru compare to a Prius?

I hate them. With fire. They complained about Ford making it more difficult to circumvent the emission controls on their new diesel a few yeas ago.
Also worthy of that are the gasoline modders that bypass the catalytic converters. They just aren't as visible.

 

That official CARB cert sheet (Executive Order) also gives the certified US06 and SC03 emissions. The X3 28d is certified at 0.003 g/mile and 0.01 g/mi NMHC+NOx, US06 and SC03, respectively. The certified CO emissions are 0.02 g/mi for both US06 and SC03. The SULEV SFTP standard under LEV 3 is 0.050 g/mi NMOG+NOx for US06 and 0.020 g/mi NMOG+NOx for SC03. Thus the X3 28d should easily meet those standards even under LEV 3.

I should have specified the 328d meets LEV II SULEV standards. I didn't specify the specific LEV standard initially because the 328d (and X3 28d for that matter) is certified under LEV II, so we will have to wait for a few years to see how it fits in the emission categories under LEV 3 (all vehicles must be certified under LEV 3 in 2017). Even though the 328d has significantly higher US06 NMHC+NOx emissions, it still meets the 0.14 g/mi US06 NMHC+NOx standard under LEV II (there's no distinction between the LEV II emission categories for SFTP NMHC+NOx or CO for LEV, ULEV or SULEV). See Emission Standards: USA: Cars and Light-Duty Trucks—Tier 2 for more information on SFTP standards under Tier 2/LEV II.

 

Ok clear as mud to me.

Part of the confusing things to me about carb catagories are waranty requirements. SULEV and ULEV II require numbers at 120,000 miles. I have no idea how they test for that on a new car as a 12 year old car with 120,000 miles will break many more things than a 1 year old car driven that distance. Do you know how they test for such things, and what the manufacturer is responsable for, and what the driver is responsible for, versus say ULEV I which only has 50,000 mile requirements.

When I lived in california, friend had an old mustang, which was allowed to pollute much more than my car, he just had to "try to fix". I assume these warranty requirements have something to do with emissions tests grandfathering older cars in california.

 

It's my understanding that vehicle emissions are typically measured at 4000 miles, and EPA emission deterioration factors are used to determine emissions at 120,000 miles. Don't know for sure how EPA derived those deterioration factors, although I believe EPA has determined that the average car is driven 11,493 miles per year.

Kind of wish LEV 3 standards were not raised in this discussion since it further adds to the confusion.

 

well EPA has it level 5 in bin 5, no need for confusing names with waranty requirements. Its clear that the prius is cleaner as its level 7 (higher better) in bin 3 (lower is better). What is unclear is how clean these things need to be in non-attainment areas.

I wasn't bringing up the upcoming standards, I just don't understand today's standards for CARB states, especially as related to waranty requirements at the higher levels.

New standards do propose a few good things at least the epa ones. They have combined NMOG and NOx instead of treating these each individually which hurts automakers making the most cost effective pollution control. They are talking about testing the cars with a fuel more like they will actually use on the road E10 lower octane which will change emissions. They change the bins to be more understandable. I'm not sure what is actually going to be the new standard, but hopefully we drop warranty and gas tank size out of emissions ratings.

 

I completely agree about having NMOG and NOx combined into one standard, and using a more representative certification fuel in the emissions testing.

However, I am less sold on EPA's "smog score" (if that is what you are referring to with your reference to "level 5" and "level 7"). In addition to the BMW 328d technically meeting SULEV II, but only certified as ULEV, and thus getting a "smog rating" of "6" when it should get an "8" (EPA's "smog score" is based entirely on the Bin or LEV category a specific car model is certified to), there's the example of the 2014 Passat, which has a version of the 1.8T gasoline model which is certified PZEV by CARB and gets a "smog rating" of "9". The TDI version is clearly ULEV and consequently gets a "smog rating" of "6" (Compare Side-by-Side). Yet if you compare the actual overall emission profile (i.e., including FTP, US06 and SC03 certified emissions), the TDI actually has lower emissions across-the-board (0.030 g/mi NMHC+NOx (TDI); 0.032 g/mi (1.8T); CO and PM emissions are also lower). So from an air quality perspective, the TDI has less effect on air quality than the PZEV-certified 1.8T gasser, based on the CARB certified emissions.

 

Well then if that is true, the epa's bins are equally screwed, if they base them not on actual tested emissions but on manufacturers decisions. Why do we pay these guys to obfuscate. Can't they just test the cars and tell us how clean they come out, instead of all this miss reporting. If you go into testing with the intention of reporting bad data, you can expect bad decissions based on that bad data.

 

It's called "Gaming-the-Rules" and the results are that *questionable* (bad) data then "steers" the EPA gooberment decision-making (a) TOWARD the results the manufacturers WANT to happen and (b) AWAY from the results they do NOT want to happen. Can you say: "...behind-the-scenes manipulation..?" sure you can!

 

Some of the emission control technologies are still relatively new in terms of real world use. That means less data on how the systems will hold up at the 120k mile mark in a personal car, which is where the difference between bin5 and the better bins takes affect. Whereas we have decades of data for gasoline cars. Remember the required federal warranty on these components is 8yrs/100k mi. They are certifying to a lower standard for the same reason the Prius is only bin3 in non-CARB states, to save on potential warranty repairs. Hopefully this will change as the systems prove their functionality over time.

 

That really is too bad if we are saying things pollute more just because they have newer tech.

Most of the non-compliance places have emissions testing, and california, the most air polluted state should be able to remove cars from the road if they fail. That would be the straightforward, easy to understand thing. Instead they charge more in fees to newer cars, which keeps older cars on the road longer. Is it any wonder that it is still out of epa compliance in many areas. What is it, over 50,000 people die each year because of transportation or utility air pollution. A good chunk of them are in california, and we have rules hindering tech from helping to solve the problem.

OK, back to lexus. If I understand you and wxman correctly new lexus puts out more unhealthy pollution like NMHC + NOx than a new diesel like the 328d, but its acting as if they have trouble refueling in the 18000 diesel stations in this country. Bad lexus.

 

That last paragraph ^^^ should be bolded. It's the whole thesis of the thread.

According to CARB..... equally clean. They don't care how a car achieves a SULEV rating + zero evaporative emissions.

BTW I'm not sure why everyone is so confused about the warranty? It just means if your car fails the emissions exam during the first 150,000 miles (emits more dirt than SULEV), then you don't have to pay for it. Simple.

 

The manufacturer pays for it, and they likely figured that extra warranty work into the price of the car.

 

Do you have a link ? At those values the car should manage LEV III SULEV, but that is not what I found in the EPA data sheets I found (and linked to as a Google Doc.)

pdf: BMW 328d Emissions - Sheet2-2.pdf

Here the combined emissions of NOx and NMHC on the US-06 cycle are 120 mg/mile, four times the allowable maximum for SULEV certification under LEV III.

Now, why LEV III you ask ? Because LEV III is mandatory in CARB compliant states from MY 2014 -- NOW. I'm sure the modern X3 28d was a model of pollution control if it could be sent to the 1970s too, but that just does not interest me. Compared to its 2014 new model competition, the car is dirty. Compare it to a Prius, and it is an embarrassment. Compare it to an even dirtier older diesel and you have spin.

 

http://www.arb.ca.gov/msprog/onroad/cert/pcldtmdv/2015/bmw_ldt_a0080368_2d0_u2_diesel.pdf

Again, this is certified to LEV II, not LEV III, but it appears that the X3 28d would be able to meet LEV SULEV30 standards if not SULEV20 standards. In addition to more strict SFTP standards, LEV III (and federal Tier 3) has extended vehicle useful life to 150,000 miles. Also, your link was for the 2014 328d, not the 2015 X3 28d.