Environmental group accuses German car giant of breaking the law and worsening air pollution
scmp.com
Sidney Leng
December 15, 2015
A non-governmental organisation said a Chinese court in Tianjin had accepted its lawsuit against Volkswagen China, accusing it of worsening air pollution and breaking product quality laws.
China changed environmental laws earlier this year to make it easier for NGOs to sue suspected polluters, and the legal action comes after VW admitted to faking emissions tests overseas.
The China Biodiversity Conservation and Green Development Foundation said the court issued a document accepting the case on Thursday. “We have studied the air pollution problems induced by motor vehicles for a while,” Ma Yong, deputy secretary general of the foundation, a semi-official NGO, told the South China Morning Post.
“There were other carmakers that had cheated on emissions tests in China. The VW scandal just gave us an opportunity to bring our first public case on air pollution.”
A spokeswoman from VW China said in an email that the company paid close attention to the case and its legal department hadn’t received the indictment paper from the court yet.
In September, the world’s second-largest carmaker admitted that it had installed emissions-cheating software on 11 million diesel-engine vehicles distributed worldwide.
More than 1,900 made it to the mainland market through the Tianjin-registered importer. Beijing has pressed it to recall the vehicles, but no penalty has been imposed so far.
“VW China will update the softwares installed on 1,950 diesel-engine vehicles that were imported into the Chinese market. Once relevant technical solutions are confirmed, we will report them to government authorities and explain them to affected consumers,” VW China’s spokeswoman wrote.
In its filing made late last month, the foundation said VW China should publicly apologise and be fined for allowing the vehicles into the country.
By doing so, it had violated laws on environmental protection and product quality, and worsened air pollution, it alleged.
The size of the fines the NGO is seeking has not been disclosed. This is the third reported case of public-interest litigation over air pollution brought by NGOs since revisions to the Environmental Protection Law came into effect in January, according to Friends of Nature, another environmental NGO.
“On air pollution cases, it’s difficult to collect evidence, unlike water or soil pollution cases where you can collect samples,” said Ge Feng, a legal consultant with Friends of Nature.
Ma said most of the information they collected for their lawsuit case came from third-party organisations and environmental experts.
This is the third NGO lawsuit successfully filed to mainland courts since January. Friends of Nature sued an aluminium maker over its emissions in a Qingzhen court in Guizhou. In November, the factory was ordered in November to issue an apology and pay legal fees.
In March, the All-China Environment Federation filed a lawsuit with a court in Dezhou in Shandong province, seeking compensation of nearly 30 million yuan from a local glass manufacturer over its emissions. The court accepted the case but no decision has been reached yet.
