Euro 7: Diesel vehicles cleaner than e-cars
With the new emission standard, the EU demands utopian emission values for combustion vehicles. Experts therefore estimate that the new rules will have hardly any impact on air quality, and thus not on impending driving bans.
The new Euro7 emissions standard is due to come onto the roads in 2025. It is intended to reduce the emission limits of combustion engines by about half. Christian Beidl, head of the Institute for Internal Combustion Engines and Vehicle Drives at the Technical University of Darmstadt and Thomas Koch, head of the Institute for Piston Engines at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) have now spoken in the debate on the new emissions standard. Although moderate stricter requirements for new vehicles make sense, the new emissions standard will not affect air quality in the conurbations of German and European cities.
According to Beidl, the renewal of fleets takes a long time, so that the effect of the tightening will only be felt years later. The new Euro-Norm would therefore come at a time when even the current Euro-Norm 6 has not yet had its full effect, as there are still many older cars on the roads. According to Koch, the limit values for Euro 6 are already so strict that many combustion engines already perform better than electric cars, at least in terms of nitrogen oxide emissions: "With today's electricity mix in Germany, the nitrogen oxide emissions of an electric car are the equivalent of 80 to 100 milligrams per kilometre, which is significantly higher than those of the most modern diesel vehicles. Even now, these emissions are already no higher than about 30 micrograms of nitrogen oxide per kilometre. The new limit values of the Euro 7 standard, which must be achieved even after 200,000 km of mileage and under the most extreme conditions, for example with a cold engine and trailer, cannot be met by any of the latest generation e-cars.
The new limit values are therefore an enormous challenge for the car industry, which will probably also have an impact on the prices of the new generation of combustion engines and could therefore hinder the renewal of the vehicle fleet.
The experts' assessment of the new Euro standard and the lack of improvement in air quality also means that limit values could continue to be exceeded in large cities. This is bad news for our health, but also for driving bans and the extension of low emission zones, which therefore remain likely.