By Ilona Wissenbach and Andrey Sychev
HANNOVER, Germany (Reuters) – Daimler Truck, one of the world's largest commercial vehicle makers, aims for half of its European sales to come from electric trucks by 2030, the head of its Mercedes-Benz Trucks unit, Karin Radstrom, said on Monday.
Radstrom, who will take over the reins of the entire group next month, aims to sell up to 30,000 electric trucks, or half of Daimler's total vehicle sales in Europe, by the end of the decade.
“We hope that we are so good that we can do even more,” he said at a press conference during the IAA transport fair in Hanover.
Daimler Truck will begin production of its first fully electric heavy-duty truck, the Mercedes-Benz eActros 600, in November this year and has already received 2,000 orders.
Outgoing CEO Martin Daum said on Monday that he does not see any easing in the European truck market in the first half of 2025.
The group is facing subdued demand after shortages of chips and other parts due to the COVID-19 pandemic drove up production costs.
The trucking industry also faces challenges in reducing pollution from commercial vehicles, while logistics companies, its main customers, are not willing to pay more for electric trucks because the charging infrastructure is still far from complete.
For Daimler Trucks' chief technology officer Andreas Gorbach, the European Union's 45 percent carbon emissions reduction target for 2030 seems unlikely to be achievable at the current pace of charging infrastructure development in Europe.
He suggested that targets should instead be linked to the pace of infrastructure development and reviewed each year depending on progress.
“In the past, someone had to build the highways so trucks could drive on them… and the highway of the future is the freight infrastructure,” Gorbach said.
“Now is the time to change gears, otherwise it becomes unrealistic,” he added.
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