The National Environment Agency (NEA) has advised owners of diesel vehicles to get their vehicles inspected and serviced to meet tighter emission standards that will take effect on January 1, 2014.
In a statement on Wednesday, NEA said it has been working closely with authorised vehicle inspection centres to alert owners whose vehicles show borderline results during the mandatory inspection.
Such inspections are made at VICOM, JIC Inspection Services or STA Inspection.
NEA also said a six-month grace period will be given for vehicles that show borderline test results, to give vehicle owners time to adjust to the higher standards.
The tighter emission standards was announced in the government’s budget debate this year.
It requires all diesel vehicles in use in Singapore to have a smoke opacity test result of 40 Hartridge Smoke Units (HSU) or lower from January 1, 2014.
The current requirement is 50 HSU and lower.
The new requirement is part of efforts to keep the air in Singapore clean and safe.
Owners whose vehicles fail to meet the standard can be fined up to S$5,000.
Figures from NEA show that more vehicles are being fined for failing to meet the requirement — the number has gone up from 4,794 in 2011 to 6,381 in 2012.
The figure for this year is trending high — for the first nine months, 5,809 vehicles failed to meet the requirement and the owners were fined.
