Lower Saxony in the emissions dilemma: Clean and dirty cars in comparison!

Lower Saxony in the emissions dilemma: Clean and dirty cars in comparison!

In Lower Saxony there is a colorful picture when it comes to the types of vehicles on the roads. According to a current analysis by the Federal Motor Transport Authority (KBA), there are both the cleanest and the dirtiest cars in the country here. Vehicle emissions standards vary greatly and are distributed very differently in the different registration districts. The proportion of cars with old emissions standards, i.e. Euro 1 to Euro 4, is between 10% and 33.7%. The highest proportion is particularly noticeable in Wendland (Lüchow-Dannenberg) at 33.7%, followed by Nienburg and Salzgitter, where around 30% of vehicles each have old emissions standards.

In stark contrast to this is Wolfsburg, the city that has the lowest proportion of old emissions standards at 10.9%. There is no other place in Germany with an even better value. Here the city particularly benefits from VW's presence, which leads to many new car purchases and company cars. VW employees also enjoy special offers when purchasing new cars, which explains the continuous increase in new cars. In Wolfsburg there are an impressive 973 cars per 1,000 inhabitants, which means that on average there is even more than one car per adult.

The electric revolution and its spread

The statistics about electric cars provide another interesting fact: Wolfsburg also leads with 77.2% of vehicles with the new Euro 6 emissions standard. For comparison: in cities like Munich, Ingolstadt and Stuttgart this proportion is only between 62.7% and 64.8%. This makes it clear that citizens' income has a significant influence on the purchase of new and environmentally friendly vehicles. Wealthy areas seem to have a good hand here.

New registrations on the car market show another trend: Lewk 2025, the proportion of new registrations of gasoline and diesel vehicles fell. In May 2025, only 28.4% petrol cars and 14.7% diesel vehicles were newly registered, which corresponds to a decrease of 24.1% and 21.8% compared to the previous year. In contrast, hybrid vehicles experienced a significant increase at 38.5% and electric cars at 18%. This shows that more and more people are turning to alternative drives.

Emissions: A pressing problem

But not everything is going smoothly, as the data from the Federal Environment Agency makes clear. The transport sector has hardly contributed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. In fact, the share of transport in total emissions rose from 13% in 1990 to 22% in 2023. Transport is responsible for 37% of nitrogen oxide emissions and 17% of particulate matter emissions in Germany. Even though particle emissions from traffic have been reduced by around 63% since 1995, motorized road traffic remains the main cause of this air problem.

The air in metropolitan areas is heavily polluted with nitrogen dioxide, which is primarily due to the high emissions from camping vehicles. It remains clear that Germany still has a long way to go to meet its ambitious goals of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 65% ​​by 2030 and achieving climate neutrality by 2045.

Overall, it shows that the development in the interaction of cars, emissions and emissions standards in Lower Saxony and especially in Wolfsburg can be groundbreaking for the entire Federal Republic. The trend towards new drives and technologies that could improve air quality in the future remains positive.