Volkswagen’s Long and Winding Road Ahead

You could hear the sense of betrayal in the voice of the Congresswoman from Colorado.

"My first car was a 1960 Beetle," said Rep. Diana DeGette, during an October 8 Congressional hearing on the Volkswagen emissions scandal. She waxed nostalgic about her grandmother who owned the car before her, the fabric roof, and simpler times when cars didn't have all those corruptible computers on board.

Her fond memories and those of other VW-owning members of Congress only deepened the anger running through the room, captured in DeGette's assertion that the company now has "purposefully deceived millions of customers." Over a few short weeks, the carefully crafted and hard-won image of Volkswagen as a youthful, hip, environmentally-friendly company has been crowded out by a darker image of a corporate goliath that forgot its values in its drive to become the world's largest automaker.

Charles Lane, a columnist for the Washington Post, writes of the personal pride he took in being someone who cared enough to buy what he thought was a green, clean diesel Jetta, named "car of the year" by Green Car Journal. Worse than any financial loss is "the psychological blow – and I don't know how they'll make us whole for that."

Volkswagen's betrayal ripples on: Lane relied on Green Car Journal, which, in making its now-rescinded award, relied on data from the Environmental Protection Agency, which, in turn, relied on the honesty of Volkswagen. That trust has been broken. The EPA, which has allowed carmakers to self-report emissions based on laboratory tests, now plans to step up expensive and cumbersome road testing of all new vehicles, regardless of manufacturer.

"The EPA is overworked—but this is necessary, because this has shown the system can be gamed," says Green Car Journal's editor and publisher, Ron Cogan.

Now, Cogan and other advocates of environmentally friendly vehicles are only hoping that VW's fraud doesn't cast suspicion on promising developments in advanced diesel engines. "There's certainly room for diesel in the United States," he says. "There are plenty of models, and no evidence of impropriety from any other manufacturer." As for Volkswagen, Cogan adds, "Owner loyalty is a big thing—and a lot of loyalty has been compromised."