I came across this interesting chart which aims to compare different truck brands’ readiness to transition across to zero emission truck sales. It does throw up some interesting pointers, which may not be very important to the Australian truck market, at this point, but these sorts of factors may come into play at a later date.

This chart was compiled by a European organisation, which is a coalition of environmental campaigners from around the continent, called Transport & Environment which has been campaigning on environmental issues for 30 years.

According to T&E: “The ranking assesses the compatibility of their voluntary zero-emission sales announcements with climate needs, and the extent to which they are aligning their industrial plans and business activity with those targets.”

There are some interesting takeaways from this chart, and it has to be said at this point that we cannot be certain just how relevant this is to the Australian truck market. T&E does have credibility in its home continent, and therefore, it probably does give us an indication of just exactly where the situation actually lies at this point in time.

As you would expect, major European truck manufacturers are up front, Scania and Mercedes Benz plus MAN are all above 70 per cent. In the next group in the 50s and 60s, we see Volvo in Europe and Renault trucks, but also Navistar. The next group down includes a Iveco, Freightliner, Mack and Volvo US. In the lowest scoring group there are the Paccar brands, DAF, Kenworth and Peterbilt.

Now these rankings may be based upon each truck manufacturers public announcements and this chart may just indicate some have a more successful method of promoting the company’s green credentials. Paccar is famously tight lipped about its plans and may be marked down accordingly. But it may also be an indication of just how important each company takes the issue of zero emissions.

Up there in that top group, we also see Tesla, BYD and Xos. All of these companies have presented vehicles to the public with plenty of fanfare, and are solely in the zero emissions game. There are not enough of these trucks on the roads, either in the US or Europe at the moment for us to fully assess just exactly how strong their claim is to be in that top group.

It is surprising to see Volvo in the second group as they have definitely sold plenty of electric trucks in Europe and the US, and are pushing hard to get models out and available on the market.

Navistar are the highest ranked of all of the traditional US truck brands which would be a surprise until we understand that Navistar is now part of the wider Traton Group alongside Scania, MAN and Volkswagen. It’s clear that all of that technology which the group is developing will also migrate across the Atlantic to the Navistar brand in the fullness of time.