Diesel trucks are the backbone of the national supply chain, but figures buried in recent sales data could mark the beginning of the end for these kings of the road.

One of the few positives to come out of the Western Asia war. We needed this petrol shock to do what we should have been doing much earlier. It’s great that the costs have gone down but lack of appropriate charges is still a problem.

Electric trucks had their strongest ever month of sales in March 2026, although they still account for a small proportion of total sales.

For the first time, electric models are available for the same up-front cost as their diesel equivalents, including for road trains.

There are anecdotal reports of a surge of interest in electric trucks as companies seek to reduce their exposure to the risk of future diesel price spikes.

  • nonentity@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    2·
    25 days ago

    I’m well aware of the costs and configuration of semis, b-doubles/triples, and road trains. Modifications to the trailers and dollies wouldn’t be a requirement, but electrification opens a lot more possibilities, and don’t even require the prime mover to be modified first.

    There are already road trains with trailers fitted with diesel engines and drive axles for extreme weight loads, and they would be a good test case for conversion.

    The Janus system isn’t Diesel-Electric, they’ve developed an electric motor as a drop in replacement for a standard truck diesel engine, it mates to the existing gear box and drive train of the truck, and also replaces the fuel tanks with battery bays. My intro to them was around the time this video was published.

    Battery swapping will be a challenge until the infrastructure is built out for longer routes, but it would be a one off outlay for a fleet operator, and will only become more practical the more it’s deployed.

    I see the opposite correlation with higher light vehicle electrification. Once fuel demand drops enough, its unit production cost will increase, which will only make electric transport more attractive economically.