The Ministry of Transport in Japan is considering introducing dedicated lanes for self-driving trucks on highways connecting major cities to help reduce congestion and address driver shortages.

New European legislation mandating the use of tyre pressure monitoring systems (TPMS) for all new commercial vehicles, including trailers, came into effect on July 7. Any tyre pressure change that exceeds 20% must be displayed (in real-time) on the driver's dashboard, alerting them to the issue as a safety precaution.

The Zemo Partnership has been formed to aid the new government in its plans to accelerate road transport decarbonisation. The Council will work closely with over 200 member organisations to develop a roadmap for net zero transport.

The amended legislation will further reduce CO2 emissions from road transport and introduce new targets for 2030, 2035 and 2040. 

The TransMilenio system in the city of Bogotá, Colombia, claims to have an electric bus fleet of over 1,600 vehicles, the second largest in South America behind Santiago in Chile.

Delegates of Hydrogen UK’s annual conference, held at the National Conference Centre in Birmingham on 12 March, left the event with no doubts about the future of the burgeoning hydrogen economy. Opening the conference, Clare Jackson, CEO of Hydrogen UK, declared that “net zero is not possible without hydrogen”. The burning question is, will the UK have any significant part in its development?

The German Ministry of Transport confirmed to local media, that this is the last time the federal government funds or subsidises e-buses or e-trucks. Funds allocated for projects up until 2027 will remain. A combination of high inflation, energy instability (gas supply from Russia) and a downturn in productivity has resulted in the German government revising its 2024 economic forecast down from 1.3% to just 0.2%.

For the first time, the legislation covers cars, vans, and heavy-duty vehicles in one single piece of legislation. The above-mentioned agreement retains the Euro 6 emissions limits for cars and vans but adds stricter limits for buses and trucks, whilst introducing new limits for particles emitted from the exhaust, tyres and brakes.

While the city of Jakarta commits to being fully electric by 2030, the Indonesian and South Korean governments have signed a bilateral cooperation agreement to develop a public transportation network using battery-powered buses across cities in Indonesia.

According to the Department for Transport, all new sales of cars and vans powered solely by an internal combustion engine (ICE) will be banned by 2035, with heavy-goods vehicles following suit in 2040. This has now become law in the UK, as part of the country's Net Zero Strategy.

EC trading tariff exemptions, which were agreed upon as part of the Brexit deal, were due to end on January 1, 2024, resulting in a 10% tariff on the export of European-built battery electric vehicles to the UK and vice-versa.

The California Air Resources Board (CARB) has mandated that all ICE heavy-duty trucks (>14,000 pounds) operating in the state be registered on the state’s Clean Truck Check* database by the end of January 2024 to undergo emissions inspections bi-annually. The purpose of the programme is to ensure all emissions-related equipment (on-board diagnostics) is functioning properly for the life of the vehicle.