Judge Urged to Back Engine Settlement

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The Department of Justice and the Environmental Protection Agency brushed aside claims that the six primary U.S. diesel engine makers did not knowingly violate federal air quality rules, and urged a judge to ratify the agreement, which will cost the manufacturers more than $1 billion in fines and added costs.

Justice Department lawyers argued that since the engine makers voluntarily signed the consent agreements, their subsequent public claims of innocence were not relevant.

U.S. District Judge Henry H. Kennedy in Washington, D.C., has until June 29 to decide whether the consent decrees signed between the companies -- Caterpillar Inc., Cummins Engine Co., Detroit Diesel Corp., Mack Trucks, Navistar International Transportation Corp. and Volvo Truck Corp. -- and the EPA and Justice Department are fair, reasonable and in the public interest. The judge cannot revise the decrees if he finds something wrong. He must accept or reject them as a whole.

The settlement represents the culmination of an investigation started by the EPA in 1997 in response to concerns that engine makers were programming their electronic timing controls so the diesel engines gave off acceptable emissions under conditions covered by federal tests, but polluted up to three times as much under highway working conditions.

After signing the agreements, the engine makers denied they cheated on the tests and claimed EPA knew about and condoned for years the timing strategies they used. The settlement included no admission of guilt, and the companies, which together sell 95% of the heavy-duty diesel engines in the United States, said they signed it only to avoid protracted litigation and threats by EPA to prevent them from selling their engines.

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