International Council on Clean Transportation

The International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT) is an American multinational non-profit public policy think tank and research institute that provides technical, scientific, and policy analysis to environmental regulators on issues related to environmental, energy, and transportation policy. It is headquartered on K Street in Washington, D.C. and has a regional office in San Francisco, California, both in the United States, with international offices in São Paulo, Brazil; Berlin, Germany; and Beijing, China.

The ICCT, founded in 2001, is an independent nonprofit organization incorporated under Section 501(c)(3) of the United States tax code and is funded by the ClimateWorks Foundation, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the Energy Foundation, and the David and Lucile Packard Foundation. It operates in Europe as "ICCT Europe - International Council on Clean Transportation Europe gemeinnützige GmbH" and in Latin America as "Conselho Internacional de Transporte Limpo – ICCT Brasil" with additional operations in the Americas, Africa, Middle East, Asia, and Asia-Pacific.

Volkswagen emissions scandal
The ICCT commissioned researchers at West Virginia University to test Volkswagen diesel car emissions in 2013. In May 2014, ICCT alerted the US EPA and the California Air Resources Board that the models displayed much higher levels of nitrogen oxide emissions than permitted by law. In September 2015, the EPA said Volkswagen could be liable for up to $18 billion in penalties for using software on almost 500,000 VW and Audi diesel cars sold between 2009 and 2015 that circumvented emissions regulations, unleashing a controversy that led to multiple regulatory probes worldwide.

In 2015 an ADAC study (ordered by ICCT) of 32 Euro6 cars showed that few complied with on-road emission limits. In 2016 ICCT measured 19 new cars and found that real emissions were 40% higher than they were approved with, primarily due to the lax methods of NEDC-testing.