Automakers Hyundai and Kia will pay a $100 million civil penalty to resolve alleged Clean Air Act violations based on their sale of more than 1 million vehicles that collectively will emit approximately 4.75 million metric tons of greenhouse gases (GHG) in excess of what the automakers certified to the EPA. The companies will forfeit GHG emission credits in order to put the companies in the place they would have been had they accurately reported the GHG emissions from these vehicles in the first place. The companies also will take measures to prevent future violations. The California Air Resources Board joined the United States as a co-plaintiff in this settlement.
In 2009, the EPA found that current and projected concentrations of GHGs threaten the public health and welfare of current and future generations. At the same time, EPA found that GHG emissions from motor vehicles contribute to these threats, which include: hotter, longer heat waves that threaten the health of the sick, poor or elderly; increases in ground-level ozone pollution linked to asthma and other respiratory illnesses; as well as other threats to the health and welfare of Americans.
To address these threats of climate change, EPA set limits on GHG emissions for passenger vehicles for model years 2012 through 2025. This enforcement effort against Hyundai and Kia protects the integrity of the light-duty vehicle GHG standards by ensuring that emissions reduction credits claimed by automakers are tied t