{"id":15689,"date":"2016-11-30T17:59:07","date_gmt":"2016-11-30T17:59:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.golive.clarku.edu\/news\/2016\/11\/30\/alumnus-system-uncovered-emissions-test-cheating-by-vw-other-automakers\/"},"modified":"2025-04-02T05:44:16","modified_gmt":"2025-04-02T09:44:16","slug":"alumnus-system-uncovered-emissions-test-cheating-by-vw-other-automakers","status":"publish","type":"story","link":"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/2016\/11\/30\/alumnus-system-uncovered-emissions-test-cheating-by-vw-other-automakers\/","title":{"rendered":"Alumnus’ system uncovered emissions test cheating by VW, other automakers"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nWhen Leo Breton ’85 was getting ready to apply to colleges, he already knew he was going to major in physics<\/a>. His mother suggested he check out Clark University because of its links with Robert H. Goddard, “the father of modern rocketry.”\r\n\r\nClark was the only university to receive Breton’s application.\r\n\r\n
\"Cover
Story from Clark<\/em> magazine<\/a>, fall 2016<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n\r\nIt’s fitting, because Breton has been called the “grandfather of mobile emissions testing<\/a>.” The system he invented was used to uncover a massive scandal in the automobile industry:  Volkswagen’s widespread cheating on emissions standards.\r\n\r\nAs a mechanical engineer at the Environmental Protection Agency<\/a> in 1995, Breton oversaw the lab that performed emissions and fuel economy tests on automobiles. He wondered whether the simulations conducted in a controlled environment could ever match the results in real-world conditions. To find the answer, Breton would have to build his own system. So he did.\r\n\r\n“The challenge was to measure a moving vehicle with the same accuracy” as a lab’s heavy, expensive and enormous equipment, he says. The system he came up with fits in a car’s trunk or back seat. The Realtime, On-road Vehicle Emissions Reporter, or ROVER, comprises multiple inventions, and measures exhaust flow and emissions without having to modify the vehicle.\r\n\r\n
\"Leo
Leo Breton ’85<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n\r\n“Exhaust flow rate is difficult to measure because it changes rapidly all the time,” Breton explains, so he designed an exhaust flow meter that hooks onto the tailpipe. He had a hunch he could adapt a liquid measurement device to measure the vehicle exhaust flow rate in real time. It required a lot of work to adapt, but was very successful. He holds the patents on the flow meter and system technologies, now called the Portable Emissions Measurement System<\/a> (PEMS), which is available from two manufacturers. The commercial systems of today operate exactly as Breton showed in his seminal patents.\r\n\r\nIn the mid-1990s, Breton’s invention led to the discovery that some auto manufacturers and heavy-duty engine manufacturers had installed software devices the government considered “defeat devices,” which reduce the effectiveness of a car’s emissions-control system on some vehicles. The auto manufacturers paid settlements totaling over a billion dollars. One of the cases was the largest settlement ever reached under the Clean Air Act<\/a> prior to the discovery of the Volkswagen defeat device<\/a> in 2015.\r\n\r\nThat year, Volkswagen admitted to selling 11 million vehicles worldwide with defeat devices to fool emissions tests. The ruse was discovered by a team of scientists from West Virginia University using Breton’s ROVER technology.\r\n\r\nTo date, Volkswagen has agreed to a $15 billion settlement with the government, but that’s just the initial cost since it doesn’t include civil penalties or the myriad class action lawsuits. A criminal case is pending, and more fines for clean air violations are likely. This should mean the end of intentional emissions cheating, Breton says. “I can’t believe anybody would go there again after this one.”\r\n
If you’re a physics major at Clark, you have to show up to class, and you can’t hide because the classes are small. You really have to know what’s going on.\r\n\r\n