Germans cling to diesel cars as bans kick in
Cities of Stuttgart in the south and Kiel in the north are mulling their own diesel restrictions
Hamburg will today become the first German city to ban older diesel vehicles from some highly polluted roads as public confidence in the once-loved technology goes up in smoke.
A 1,600-metre stretch of highway and a 580-metre section of another major road will be closed to older diesels.
The port city is the first to act on a court ruling that such bans were a legitimate way for local authorities to reduce air pollution below European Union health thresholds.
Judges at the Federal Administrative Court found in February that cities could “gradually” eliminate diesel vehicles, starting with the oldest, while allowing exceptions including for emergency services, local residents and businesses.
“Germany has to do something” to improve air quality, said 37-year-old Sabine, who works on the Max-Brauer Allee, one of the roads hit by the ban.
“We should abolish diesels,” she added.
The cities of Stuttgart in the south and Kiel in the north are mulling their own diesel restrictions in the battle against air pollution, while Munich, Cologne and Duesseldorf are closely monitoring the Hamburg experiment.
Diesel was long seen by Germans as a proudly home-grown technology that could help battle climate change, with lower emissions of greenhouse gas carbon dioxide (CO2) than petrol motors.
Patented by Bavarian engineer Rudolf Diesel in 1892, the fuel is subsidised to this day in a number of European countries.
But its reputation has lain in tatters since Volkswagen’s “dieselgate” scandal broke in 2015.
New car sales plunge
The mammoth carmaker admitted to fitting millions of cars worldwide with “defeat devices” — software designed to trick regulators into thinking cars met emissions standards.
In fact, output of harmful fine particulates and nitrogen oxides (NOx), which can cause respiratory and heart diseases, was far higher than legally permitted.
Diesel’s share of new car sales plunged from 47.7 per cent in 2015 to 38.7 per cent last year.