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Volkswagen settles emissions-cheating cases for $14.7B

FILE - In this Oct. 5, 2015, file photo, the VW sign of Germany's Volkswagen car company is displayed at the building of a company's retailer in Berlin. Volkswagen diesel owners can choose to either sell their car back to the company or get a repair that could diminish the vehicle’s performance under a settlement of claims tied to the German automaker’s emissions-cheating scandal. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber, File)
FILE - In this Oct. 5, 2015, file photo, the VW sign of Germany's Volkswagen car company is displayed at the building of a company's retailer in Berlin. Volkswagen diesel owners can choose to either sell their car back to the company or get a repair that could diminish the vehicle’s performance under a settlement of claims tied to the German automaker’s emissions-cheating scandal. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber, File) FILE - In this Oct. 5, 2015, file photo, the VW sign of Germany's Volkswagen car company is displayed at the building of a company's retailer in Berlin. Volkswagen diesel owners can choose to either sell their car back to the company or get a repair that could diminish the vehicle’s performance under a settlement of claims tied to the German automaker’s emissions-cheating scandal. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber, File)

By Associated Press 1 min read

DETROIT (AP) – Volkswagen has agreed to settle consumer lawsuits and government allegations that it cheated on emissions tests by taking steps that will cost the company $14.7 billion.

Terms of the settlement were revealed Tuesday in orders filed with the U.S. District Court in San Francisco.

VW will pay just over $10 billion to either buy back the cheating diesel vehicles or repair them. It also will pay owners from $5,100 to $10,000 for their trouble. The German company also has to pay governments $2.7 billion for environmental mitigation and spend another $2 billion for research on zero-emissions vehicles in the U.S.

Lawyers say it’s the largest auto-related consumer class-action settlement in U.S. history.

Volkswagen has admitted that nearly a half million vehicles with 2-liter diesel engines were programmed to turn on emissions controls during government lab tests and turn them off while on the road.