Wireless diagnostic system for characterizing a vehicle's exhaust emissions

A system for characterizing emissions from a plurality of vehicles, each of which includes a wireless device for communicating information about the vehicle to a central location, said system comprising:

• a gateway system that receives emission related data from the plurality of wireless devices located in the plurality of vehicles, said emission-related data representative of emissions generated by each of said plurality of vehicles;
• and
• an Internet-based system that communicates with the gateway system to receive the emission-related data from the gateway system, the internet-based system comprising:
• a database system that electronically stores the emission-related data from said plurality of vehicles;
• an application system that analyzes the emission-related data to characterize the emissions of each of the plurality of vehicles;
• and
• an interface system that enables users to remotely access over the Internet the analyzed data for the plurality of vehicles.

A method for characterizing emissions from a plurality of vehicles, each of which includes a wireless device for communicating information about the vehicle to a central location, said method comprising:

• receiving emission-related data from the plurality of wireless devices located in the plurality of vehicles, said emission-related data representative of emissions generated by each of said plurality of vehicles;
• and
• electronically storing in a database the emission-related data received from the plurality of vehicles;
• analyzing the emission-related data to characterize the emissions of each of the plurality of vehicles;
• and
• providing users remote access over the Internet to the analyzed data for the plurality of vehicles.