- Gibney reveals shocking new details about VW's corporate deceit, and exposes the unholy alliance between governments and automakers that allowed the automaker to put tens of thousands of lives at risk - all for the sake of a $500 part.
- Each episode in this series deals with collecting money through the use of unscrupulous means. The term NOx in the title 'Hard Nox' refers to the Nitrogen Oxide emissions from the Volkswagen Clean Diesel with TDI (Turbocharged Direct Injection) technology. Unfortunately the technology didn't work and emissions from the Volkswagen Diesel weren't clean. This program follows the efforts of a team from West Virginia University to expose Volkswagen's results as phony. Also disputing the manufacturer's claims was the California Air Resources Board (CARB). Nobody expected a large multi-national company like VW to cheat. So the process to prove the West Virginia and CARB readings true involved much back and forth with corporate headquarters in Germany. But too many people noted the difference between what Volkswagen claimed and what the tests showed. The auto maker designed the 'defeat device' to give emission readings which passed U. S. standards. But real world delivered different results: up to 40 times the permissible levels. Finally the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued a notice of violation of the Clean Air Act. The notice was issued in 2015 and in January 2017 VW pleaded guilty to criminal charges. The company admitted they had inserted the device in order to become 'The World's Biggest Car Manufacturer'. The admission led to a fine of $2.8 Billion and a massive recall of 10 million cars and small diesel trucks. Several minor officers of Volkswagen were jailed (the rest stayed in Germany). The long process of verifying the tests ultimately showed VW intentionally lied to its own customers but it did become the World's Biggest Car Manufacturer with Japan's Toyota second and Daimler (also Germany) third. The world's biggest car manufacturer is a title it still holds.
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