According to Transport & Environment, six heavy truck manufacturers (Scania, MAN, Volvo Trucks, Daimler, Iveco and Ford Trucks) have written to the European Commission to reduce the CO2 reduction targets imposed on them for 2030. This is not an official step by their association ACEA, but the step comes at a time when sales of electric trucks are still (far) below the required level.
To achieve the target of -45% compared to average emissions in 2019/2020, one in ten trucks would have to be CO2 neutral by 2026 and this share would have to increase by 5% every year until 2030. These are the figures presented by Thomas Fabian (Chief Commercial Vehicles Officer of the automotive manufacturers association ACEA) last week during Dekra’s Commercial Vehicle Outlook conference in Berlin. However, the latest figures from manufacturers show that we are still far from that goal: the ACEA estimates the market share of electric trucks at 3.6%, but even that figure seems optimistic. The market leader (Volvo Group) achieves 3.7%, but the following manufacturers are far behind: 1.8% at Daimler Truck, 0.7% at Scania and even lower figures for the other brands.
The prospects for 2026 are hardly better if we go by the figures that manufacturers announce about their order portfolios: 4.4% at Volvo Group, 1.5% at MAN and 0.6% at Scania (less than in 2025). In other words, the more time passes, the greater the risk that the gap between market figures and the target to be achieved will widen. The causes of this limited progress are known: lack of charging infrastructure, lack of electricity in certain regions, difficulty in passing on any additional costs to customers and a still unfavorable TCO. And the likely postponement of the ETS2 regulation, which would have been beneficial for electric trucks from 2027, will not improve the situation.
The six manufacturers are therefore asking the Commission to amend the regulation on CO2 targets. According to T&E, this would involve generating allowances, which would compromise the regulatory ambition level and could slow production and reduce sales of zero-emission trucks by 27% by 2030.
