Electric HGV Powers into Westminster with T&E UK

On Tuesday 10th June, Transport & Environment UK and Welch Group held a drop-in event outside Westminster, demonstrating a zero-emission electric truck and highlighting the future of green logistics for businesses and organisations. The event also urged the Government to speed up plans for new regulations to help cut emissions from heavy-duty vehicles.

Dozens of parliamentarians came to hear directly from the operators including the Chair of the Transport Select Committee, Ruth Cadbury MP and Chair of the Environmental Audit Committee, Toby Perkins MP.

While today’s government announcement of a £2.6 billion capital investment to decarbonise transport from 2026-27 to 2029-30—including £1.4 billion specifically to boost the uptake of electric vehicles, including HGVs—is a positive and welcome step, more is needed to truly accelerate progress. The UK’s road haulage sector requires not just funding, but also clear and ambitious regulatory targets to meet its bold decarbonisation goals as set-out in 2021.

T&E UK Director Anna Krajinska said ‘Just 97 out of nearly 10,000 new trucks sold in the UK in the first three months of this year were zero-emission. That’s less than 1%. Yesterday, we brought an electric truck to Parliament to show that zero-emission trucks are not a technology of the future—they’re already on UK roads. But to unlock the growth, jobs, and investment that come with the transition, the sector needs certainty through robust regulation. We’re calling on the UK government to bring forward a zero-emission vehicle mandate for trucks. This would give manufacturers, operators, and the charging industry the confidence to invest—and help accelerate the shift to a cleaner, more resilient freight system.

Jamie Sands, Head of Solutions at Welch Group said "At Welch Group, we’re already running electric HGVs day in, day out. The technology is ready — now we need to see the right support to help operators transition at scale. The UK has a real opportunity to lead the way on zero-emission freight, but it will take collaboration between industry and government to make that happen."

This action follows after a letter, signed by 20 businesses, industry groups and NGOs, including Tesco, bottling giant Coca Cola Europacific Partners, and ChargeUK, coordinated by T&E UK in February this year, called on the government to introduce regulation to set a clear pathway to decarbonise heavy goods vehicles and buses.

The EU has already set clear rules for cutting emissions from trucks, buses, and coaches, giving its heavy-duty sector the certainty it needs to switch to cleaner vehicles. For the UK to stay competitive, it should move faster. The new ZEV mandate for cars and vans, introduced in January 2024, is already helping by providing clear targets for zero-emission sales and attracting more than £23 billion in green investment—from charging points to battery factories.

Now is the opportunity to put the UK’s HGV industry among the world’s leading when it comes to innovation and climate action. We call on the government to seize this opportunity.