The Environmental Protection Agency has filed a motion to dismiss a federal lawsuit filed by Navistar Inc., rejecting the engine maker’s claims that the agency must test selective catalytic reduction technology engines with the SCR system turned off, running without diesel exhaust fluid, and running with water instead of diesel exhaust fluid.
In its motion to dismiss, filed Friday, EPA said that federal law gives the agency’s administrator “the discretion to decide the appropriate manner of testing,” and that Navistar is asking the federal court to “intrude into the administrator’s exercise of discretion.”
“EPA has certified several engine families that use SCR technology and has not required that these engines be tested without DEF, as long as the manufacturer demonstrates to EPA that its engines are designed with appropriate strategies (e.g. warning lights, engine derates) to make operation without DEF unlikely,” the agency said.
Navistar’s lawsuit was filed against EPA in federal court for the District of Columbia in July, more than a year after the company dropped a similar 2009 lawsuit after reaching a settlement agreement with EPA.
“EPA has turned a willful blind eye to SCR non-compliance,” Navistar said at the time.
Navistar, the only heavy duty engine manufacturer to use an exhaust gas recirculation technology to meet 2010 EPA emission standards, alleged in its July lawsuit that EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson failed to require testing of the SCR engines under “actual current driving conditions.”
A Navistar spokesman declined to comment on EPA’s recent motion to dismiss the lawsuit.
