. . . Cities have been one of the primary opponents of older, high-polluting diesel vehicles, an effort that has gained recent momentum as data continues to emerge that diesels in real-world use emit many times the legal limits on nitrogen oxides under which they were certified.
The mayors of Athens, Madrid, Mexico City, and Paris now say they plan to ban all diesel cars and trucks by 2025. And London has modified its congestion charge to penalize the oldest, dirtiest vehicles, a group largely expected to be made up of diesels sold before 2004. . . .
The state of California is also a pioneer in that regard, notes a Bloomberg article last week on the phenomenon. . . .
As the Bloomberg article notes, "automakers can't afford to ignore these initiatives," especially since most of the world's anticipated population growth will take place in large cities outside North America.
Between China's increasingly stringent requirements for plug-in electric cars, carbon-emission limits in Europe and Asia, and a variety of regulatory carrots and sticks, in other words, what happens in the U.S. may be less and less relevant to the cars of the future.
