Why electric trucks need more than good intentions

Technology is no longer the biggest barrier to cleaner transport; electric trucks are arriving fast. The real question is whether the world around them is ready to put them to work.

I have just returned from the 2026 IAA Media Summit in Frankfurt, which is always held ahead of the IAA Transportation in Hanover. We were the only magazine from the African continent invited to the event – which meant we were treated to exclusive insights into global happenings within the world of transport. The overwhelming message at the summit was this: there’s a gap between what the truck industry can now build and what the wider world is ready to support. And it’s a pretty big gap…

The industry has moved

Let me explain. Battery-electric vehicles (BEVs), fuel-cell vehicles, hydrogen-powered trucks with internal combustion engines, autonomous systems, AI logistics tools and software-defined vehicles are no longer distant promises. They are products, programmes and investments that are available here and now.

As Friedrich Baumann, chief sales officer of MAN, noted: “As an industry, we are not shying away from innovation.” That hasn’t meant simply developing BEVs. Achim Puchert, CEO of Mercedes-Benz Trucks, pointed out in his first-ever media conference: “To decarbonise transport in Europe at speed, we will need more than one technology.” The OEMs have long been working on those various technologies, but sometimes bringing a technology to maturity isn’t enough.

The operator’s truth

Maximilian von Löbbecke, managing director of Renault Trucks Deutschland, was particularly outspoken during the summit. He brought the conversation back to the yard, the route and the customer waiting for delivery. “If a truck does not start in the morning, it doesn’t matter whether it drives electric or diesel,” he said.

That is a sentence every policymaker should remember. Operators do not buy intentions; they buy uptime. They do not invoice for technology; they invoice for completed trips.

Von Löbbecke went further: “Electric trucks are ready, but the world is not. In logistics, we don’t need symbolic solutions. A truck either runs or it doesn’t. A job is either profitable or not. Charging is available or not.” He is spot on. That is pure transport reality.

Where the answer is yes

This is not an argument against electric trucks; it is an argument against pretending that one answer fits every application. Von Löbbecke pointed to waste collection as a sector where electric trucks already excel. “We see sectors where electric outperforms diesel by far – such as waste collectors. In France, we are running several hundred electric waste collectors every day. We have 80% market share in French waste collection,” he expanded.

That example is important because it is practical. Waste collection is urban, predictable, route-based and usually depot-charged. Long-haul is a different calculation, with different distances, payload pressures and charging demands. South Africa must understand that distinction before copying anyone else’s transition.

The test for South Africa

Erhan Eren, director of Platform Beyond Vehicle (PBV) at Kia Europe, captured the speed of change: “I have never seen this industry changing as fast as it is right now. Every part of commercial mobility is being reshaped.”

That reshaping will reach us. But it will arrive in a market defined by long routes, tight margins, energy insecurity and uneven infrastructure. For South Africa, the question is not whether electric trucks work. It is where they work, when they work and what must exist around them before they can work reliably.

Von Löbbecke’s warning should now sit at the centre of every serious debate about cleaner transport: “Decarbonisation without infrastructure is not a policy. It is a disruption.” Exactly. If we want cleaner transport to succeed, we must build the system around the truck as diligently as the manufacturers built the truck itself.