Rather than some 400-page book, I'll try to lay out the landscape, with a couple of significant details, and explain the insider saga.
A couple of decades ago, the EU came out and felt there was a need for a clean-air standard. So they made a law, and listed out pollutants and to what degree it was OK, and where it meant action had to be taken. The blunt edge of this law....was aimed at cities...NOT states or nations. I doubt if they spent a lot of time thinking over long-term implications, but that doesn't matter at this point. If a city failed to provide adequate safe air, they would be fined....leaving the state and nation out of the whole discussion.
So years passed. The EU funneled money into monitoring stations, which were erected around all urbanized areas and major cities. You can note the stations on major avenues (four-lane streets)...usually in the heart of the city. In Wiesbaden, I think presently there are four to six of these. Data is collected and analyzed. There's no doubt that nitrogen oxide particles were being produced via diesel vehicles (trucks, buses, and private cars) throughout Germany. And there is no doubt that the numbers for decades were significant.
Along the way, the EU established standards for diesel cars. Euro 1 standard was set in 1992. As of that year, you as a auto-maker....had to meet that standard with the new cars. Euro II came in 1996, and Euro III in 2000. Euro IV came in 2005, Euro V in 2009, and we are presently in Euro VI (2014).
Somewhere about a decade ago, the VW folks were moving to a new diesel technology engine. They were supposed to able to meet the standards of Euro V. After a fair amount of development and testing, the insider crew of VW's team basically came to admit that they couldn't reach the EU standard on emissions.
We can debate the issue of the EU establishing its standards and just 'thinking' that technology will reach that standard, but it's a worthless debate. VW couldn't reach that level expected. So, they took the unethical route of inventing a software package that would fake out the test-people, and make them think that the standards were being met. They sold these cars in Germany, in Europe, and in the US.
Roughly two years ago.....the secret came out and VW fell into a major chaotic period. Now, the environmental folks had a chance to press on with forcing cities to act on clean air standards (not by German law, but by EU law). Courts were dragged into this, and city councils were forced to plan for something with serious consequences. Stuttgart was at the front of this entire pendulum-swing.
Some city-planners felt this was the opportune time to press for mass public transportation to be the big answer. You would go and force the diesel drivers to halt at some station on the outskirts of town....riding the subway or tram into the heart of the city for your job, or university study. Maybe if you'd had twenty years to really develop this idea and build the right kind of support structure....it would have worked. In the mindset of those involved....all of this had to be done in a matter of two or three years.
Some cities pressed the Chancellor to hand out a massive funding vehicle and just provide 'free' transportation. For all of Germany, just to get this up to the amount required and cover it.....you'd be talking about hundreds of billions, and years to accomplish. The Chancellor basically came up with a test program to involve five or six cities, and a limited amount of national funding to run 'free' transportation for a period of time. It'll be at least two more years before results from this test period are known, and the true cost impacts are openly discussed.
Meanwhile, the banning chatter increased. Instead of this being five or six major cities....it progressed onto more than fifty German urban areas. Some wanted a full ban of diesel cars. Some wanted two or three major avenues restricted. Some wanted the center-part of towns entirely banned.
Diesel owners? They became frustrated.
Last year, it was reported at one point that 300,000 Euro 5 diesel vehicles were sitting idly on dealer lots (used cars) and impossible to sell. When diesel owners came in and tried to resell their vehicles....the value had dropped and it was becoming impossible to get any real value out of these vehicles. You could have been sitting there with a six-year old Porsche SUV, which ought to have 25,000 Euro value still left in it, and find that the dealer wouldn't offer more than 5k to 10k Euro for the vehicle.
Vehicles being sold off into Poland or Czech? Yes....they had no problem. No cities outside of Germany were being affected by this diesel car ban chatter.
How many diesel Euro I to IV cars exist in Germany? In 2017, it was in the 6.4-million range. All of those would have easily failed the particle test.
A technology development to cleanse the older cars? This was often discussed. Several folks had projects in development and probably can meet the standards. But here we get to three curious issues: (1) the cost of the 'box' is typically 1,500 Euro....so who'd pay for it...the consumer or the nation? (2) Would the box be the permanent resolution, or would this just lead the EU to define the next standard, and this box fail to meet that....thus requiring another box (1,500 Euro more)? (3) What if the box marginalized your mileage or damaged the engine (car companies really didn't like the sound of that discussion)?
Total number of diesel cars on German streets and roads (from category I to VI)? It's generally put at between 14 and 15 million total.
Why so much interest in diesel cars? There are various factors, but most lead back to three factors: (1) mileage, if you do live sixty kilometers away from your job, it would make sense to own a diesel vehicle. (2) Dedicated German diesel owners will hype maintenance/dependability. (3) Fuel costs being less (you pay slightly more on yearly registration fees compared to gas vehicles, but if you were driving 700 kilometers a week, it does make sense).
Could the German federal government out of Berlin offered to cover cost of retiring all Euro category IV (or older) diesel cars? That would have calmed the nerves of the millions of diesel owners. No, the government was not going to do that. Could the federal government have covered the 1,500 Euro box on affected cars? That would have calmed the nerves of millions of diesel owners. No, that wasn't going to happen.
How much alarmism fell into this whole discussion? About a year ago, if you follow diesel owners and their commentary.....with that of politicians....people were beginning to talk of the alarmism angle and why all of this had to be resolved in some short fashion. At this point, you began to notice people turning and facing the EU structure and asking how this law got created, and wondering about who to blame. The Berlin leadership (doesn't matter which party you talk about....far-left to far-right) really preferred to avoid the topic of diesel cars entirely. Every answer involved funding that didn't exist.
The possibility that VW would be finally dragged into a consumer battle and be bankrupted? This kept being brought up and the consumer fraud angle is still openly discussed, with the court battle likely to end in the next two years. If the diesel car bans were averted? Well....there's no court case, and no fear of VW being permanently harmed.
If you were looking for a fine German-made 3-year old SUV for a fantastic price (low-mileage, 35-to-50 percent of its original value)? If you accept a diesel vehicle....there's tens of thousands on the market and available.
In the end, this was a 'emergency-creation' driven by the EU for a standard that the industry could not deliver. There was no fall-back position, or waiver. So here were the consumers, being stuck and screwed-over.
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