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Scania racking up green awards

For the fifth year running, Scania has won Germany’s coveted ‘Green Truck’ title.

The prestigious press test competition is organised by two leading German trade magazines and over the years has become something of a world championship in transport efficiency for long-distance trucks.

“The words that come to me are: ‘total success’ and ‘customer value’,” says Stefan Dorski, senior VP and head of Scania Trucks, in reaction to the news of the company’s latest ‘Green Truck’ triumph. 

“Winning this test five years in a row is a feat that should not be possible, yet we’ve still done it. I see it as the ultimate proof of how Scania’s powertrain technology supports our customers in their constant efforts to reach the best total operating economy,” says Dorski.

‘Green Truck’ is organised by the German trade magazines “Trucker” and “Verkehrs-Rundschau”, and the 2021 test was no less strenuous than those of previous years.

The organisers stipulated a gross train weight of 32 tonnes and up to 430hp for the trucks that took on the 360km test track north of Munich.

This year Scania entered an R 410 prime mover that managed to score a test result that left the rest of the field behind: the truck’s average consumption was measured at 23.53 litres per 100 km, while Scania also managed the highest average speed, reaching 80.60 km/h. No small feat when parts of the test route are rather challenging, with steep hills. 

The testing is rigorously monitored and takes place on public roads with a mix of highways and rural roads. Conditions that can influence the results, such as traffic and weather, are compensated for by the use of a reference truck. All the trucks have the same brand of tyres, with the same wear and pressure.  

“Being able to offer the most efficient trucks is not only part of Scania’s DNA and something we always strive for; it is also extremely important for fighting climate change and reaching our ambitious science-based targets,” says Dorski.

“Although electrification is on its way, we need the most efficient combustion engines to reach the Paris Agreement targets, something Scania is committed to.”

Scania considers press tests to be a highly significant factor in its development process. It is also of huge importance for potential truck buyers, since press tests and the evaluations that independent journalists do are actually the most relevant consumer information available on the market.

“Some people might think that press test trucks are ‘prepared’ or somehow produced on purpose; they are not,” explains Dorski.

“They are regular production trucks, just like the ones our customers can order. They are admittedly well kept and well maintained, but I recommend that all truck owners do so. The really great thing about ‘Green Truck’ and other press tests is that these winners from Scania are the same breed of trucks that our customers use in their daily operations.”

Scania ahead in CO2 emissions reduction

Figures from the European Commission confirm that Scania is by far the best among the heavy vehicle manufacturers to reduce CO2 emissions.

Trucks, buses and coaches are responsible for about a quarter of CO2 emissions from road transport in the EU and for some 6% of total EU emissions. Despite some improvements in fuel consumption efficiency in recent years, these emissions are still rising, mainly due to increasing road freight traffic.

In 2019 the EU legislated on the first-ever EU-wide CO2 emission standards for heavy-duty vehicles, and set targets for reducing the average emissions for 2025 and 2030. According to the new rules, manufacturers must reduce CO2 emissions from new trucks by an average of 15% from 2025 and 30% from 2030, compared with 2019 levels.

Recently the EU Commission published statistics on CO2 emissions from new trucks for each heavy vehicle manufacturer registered in the Union from July 2019 to June 2020. These values form the basis for limits in the CO2 legislation and will be the basis for road tolls.

In the report, Scania is best in class in terms of energy efficiency and low CO2 emissions, 4.7% below the CO2 limit set by the EU. 

“The CO2 figures published by the EU show that there is a clear market leader in fuel consumption – Scania. These figures are based on certified testing of components and trucks and reflect Scania’s unique and long-term work with aerodynamics and driveline,” says Henrik Wentzel, senior advisor at product planning at Scania.

“The advantage of the certified CO2 values that the EU publishes is that everyone has to try and calculate in the same way – this is the fairest way available to compare emissions between manufacturers,” says Wentzel.

Andreas Follér, head of sustainability at Scania, says the figures from the European Commission also show that Scania is on the right track in reaching even its Science Based Target – to reduce CO2 emissions from the vehicles when in use by 20% by 2025, compared to 2015. 

Scania says it is the only one of Europe´s heavy vehicle manufacturers that has an approved Science Based Target (SBT).

“Our ambition is to lower the climate impact in the short and medium timeframe for both SBT and EU legislation. The main difference is that EU CO2 legislation is only covering Tank-to-Wheel (TtW) emissions,” says Follér.

“Our SBT are measured Well-to-Wheel (WtW). If only looking at tailpipe emissions it doesn’t matter if a truck runs on 100% HVO or 100% fossil diesel, or if the truck runs on biogas or natural gas. But for our Science Based Target, for our customers and for the planet, this matters a lot.”

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