My Diesel Scenario for Germany

In the last day or two, there's been several news reports, and it's obvious that two different directions are being taken by the German government.  The SPD has it's figure in the Environmental Ministry....Barbara Hendricks, who is bound and determined to remove diesel cars which are deemed a threat.  And then there's the CSU head of the Transport Ministry, who is trying to give the car industry some exit plan.

So, I'm going to make this prediction.

Shortly after the the election is wrapped up and the coalition government is formed, everyone is going to be be shocked over the next big step of the Merkel-led government.  Cash-for-diesel-junkers.

My prediction is that from the diesel variations....one through six....it will be determined that one to four (roughly anything made prior to 2009), will be offered two deals and an end-date for their vehicle.

My humble guess is that the end-date will be sometime by the end of 2018.  At that point, all of these cars with version four of the diesel standard....will be deemed 'junk'.

The two deals?  Deal one will be a 100-percent blue-book value on the car if you go and order an electric vehicle to replace it.   Deal two will be a 75-percent blue-book value on the car if you go and purchase a gas-powered car.

The 100-percent deal will be an enticement seen to help jump-start the whole electric car idea, and I suspect in some ways....this is the ultimate goal for Hendricks and her Environmental Ministry.  Let's be honest here.  At the end of 2016, there were roughly 75,000 electric cars in Germany, and there's simply no real interest by the general public in this trend.  It's still a decade from taking off, if you allow the market to drive the interest.

I drove to Den Haag this past week, and stopped at a autohof half-way there.  In the corner of the lot was a major re-charging station, with a dozen units sitting there and half of the spaces had cars in the recharge stage.  The folks were going to stop for an hour and have lunch.....so it made sense to use the time wisely and recharge.

Hostility over offering a blue-book value here?  Oh yes.

The thing is that the government stood by the car companies and allowed all of this to reach this current stage.  The government often brags about excess money which will be sitting there in 2019....with several billion Euro.  Well, put the money to good use.

You also have to ask yourself....generally, what's the value of a five-to-ten year old car?  I doubt if the amount for each vehicle goes above 8,000 Euro.  In the case of some of these vehicles....being over twenty years old....there's virtually zero blue-book value and a thousand Euro might be the best deal to accept.

The number involved?  One can only take a guess there....but it's probably in the five-million range.