Pollutant Emissions

Under the impression of the emissions issue with diesel vehicles, the Kraftfahrt-Bundesamt (KBA) was commissioned by the Federal Ministry for Digital and Transport (BMDV) to take organisational and technical preparatory measures in order to be able to implement and carry out the following measures:

• Establishment of state test benches,
• Random checks on the conformity of series-production vehicles,
• Disclosure of engine software

Initial checks on external test benches in terms of field monitoring were already carried out in 2015. The results were presented in April 2016. Since then, they have been available to interested parties in the report of the Investigative Commission "Volkswagen".

First report by the “Volkswagen” Commission of Inquiry (Nitrogen oxides/NO_x)PDF, 2MB, File does not meet accessibility standards

With this background, KBA has been conducting its own exhaust emission tests on type-approved vehicles since 2016.

The exhaust gas tests are carried out in particular with KBA's own portable emission measurement systems" (PEMS) and, in addition, with stationary exhaust gas roller dyna-mometers. To supplement the real driving emissions (RDE) and roller dynamometer measurements and to check safety-relevant vehicle functions, a KBA-owned test track is set up on a runway of an airfield that is no longer in use in order to test the vehicles in the field in various driving situations.