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Toyota's Position in Regards to California Air Resources Board

3 September 1998

Statement of Toyota's Position in Regards to California Air Resources Board

    TORRANCE, Calif., Sept. 2 -- The following statement may be
attributed to Jim Olson, Senior Vice President, External Affairs for Toyota
Motor Sales, U.S.A., Inc.:

    "Toyota regrets that the California Air Resources Board (CARB) has chosen
to take action that involves an ordered recall.  We firmly believe that our
On-Board Diagnostic (OBD) II system complies with the CARB regulations.
    We have been cooperating for several months with CARB's investigation of
our OBD system with regard to detection of evaporative leaks.  CARB says that
the monitoring computer in our system does not check errors frequently enough
and that Toyota's OBD system does not conform to the current interpretation of
the regulation.  We maintain that it does and hope this matter can be resolved
in a mutually acceptable way.
    There is no evidence of an emissions-related problem with these vehicles.
Toyota vehicles have the best in-use emission performance of any automaker's
products, and because we believe these vehicles comply with CARB's
regulations, we reluctantly filed a suit on the 28th of August seeking a
determination from the court that our vehicles comply.
    We value that we have been recognized by environmental and industry groups
as an environmental leader, and hope for a speedy resolution that will be
beneficial for all parties."