Disagree if you may, but US President Donald Trump strikes me as a bit of a truck man. A 2017 photo of him welcoming the president and CEO of the American Trucking Association to the White House, framed by the bonnets of a white Volvo and a black Mack, depicts him as a man who understands that everything gets to where it’s going on the back of a truck – regardless of what commodity it is and whether it’s been produced domestically or imported along with half a trailer load of absurd tariffs.

The man’s international trade strategies aside, US trucking groups last month applauded his administration’s reconsidering of stricter emissions rules set by the Biden administration to apply to 2027 model year vehicles, among other emissions-related changes – conditions the industry argued were unachievable on existing timelines.

This followed California – the US’s poster child for both progressive rules around environmental friendliness and high air pollution – withdrawing its waiver request to implement the EPA’s proposed Advanced Clean Fleets rule with the change of government in January. The rule would have required manufacturers to stop selling diesel trucks in the state by 2036. Again, the trucking industry opposed it as being extreme and unachievable.

Sure, with Trump’s administration being the complete opposite of Biden’s, changes were inevitable. Some may denounce them as a step backwards; others may applaud them as a return to common sense. But it’s not only the US that’s giving internal combustion a reprieve.

In January, Australia’s NatRoad CEO Warren Clark stated, “As we face the challenge of reducing carbon emissions, it’s crucial that we consider the future of the internal combustion engine.” He called for a Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) to help meet the government’s carbon reduction goals by “gradually decreasing the carbon intensity of the fuels we use, rather than relying solely on the rapid transition to technologies not yet ready for use in all specific freight tasks”.

As part of a very well- structured argument, he said the LCFS “creates a stable investment environment by setting a carbon intensity reduction target for fuel suppliers that increases over time”, “allows the market to find the most cost-effective solutions”, and “offers a practical transition pathway for every trucking business in Australia”.

Be it political instability, the lacklustre rollout of infrastructure, high purchase prices or products not being fit for widespread adoption – or all these reasons and more, and regardless of how environmentally important it may be – the market just isn’t there yet for the mass uptake of vehicles powered by alternative propulsion. This has been evident in other recent events. Early this year, Hyzon shut up shop – leaving the Pacific region in the lurch – and in mid-February, Nikola filed for bankruptcy protection to sell off its assets and wind down operations (perhaps inevitable given its dubious record virtually since inception).

The established OEMs are under the pump, too. A couple of months ago, Scania announced it and DHL had jointly developed and were testing an electric truck with a petrol-powered range extender, with DHL Group CEO Tobias Meyer calling it “a pragmatic solution for making logistics more sustainable” and Scania CEO Christian Levin saying it’s “an example of interim solutions that can enhance the scaling of decarbonised heavy transport before the transport system eventually becomes 100% electrified”.

Last month, we ran a piece by Andreas Gorbach, Daimler Truck AG board member and head of truck technology, decrying an increasingly tough European legislative environment. While, in announcing its 2024 financial results and laying out “its roadmap for profitable growth”, Mercedes-Benz (cars) included “electrified high-tech ICE” in its future product plan.

It all seems that, in the first quarter of 2025, the global trucking industry’s vision of its future is more clouded than it’s ever been. OEMs that have invested billions have lost everything or are having to find innovative ways to make those investments pay off. Governments can’t seem to provide clear pathways other than what aligns with their ideology. All sides seem to be fighting each other while the can gets kicked further down the road.

Yes, everything gets to where it’s going on the back of a truck … probably the only consistency in this whole picture.