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EPA rulemaking fallout fogs H2 truck sales lens: Lundstedt
CEO Lundstedt cites July 9 draft rule as key factor in fleet demand
A Volvo VNL 860. Volvo Group’s total order intake in North America increased 122% year on year to 18,302 trucks in Q2. (Volvo)
Key Takeaways:
- Volvo Group CEO Martin Lundstedt said July 17 that EPA’s July 9 draft NOx rulemaking is clouding the outlook for North American Class 8 truck sales.
- Orders remain strong, with North America bookings up triple digits and industrywide June orders up 231% year over year, though Volvo’s regional sales fell 6%.
- Volvo maintained its 265,000-unit 2026 forecast but said second-half deliveries and possible EPA ’27 pre-buy activity will depend on rule interpretations and compliance details.
Elements of the Environmental Protection Agency’s recent draft notice of proposed rulemaking on nitrogen oxide emissions are clouding the outlook for Class 8 truck sales, even as orders continue to outpace expectations, according to Volvo Group’s top executive.
Retail sales are set to ramp up in the second half of 2026, Volvo Group CEO Martin Lundstedt told analysts during the company’s second-quarter 2026 earnings call July 17, but the magnitude of fleet appetite will depend on interpretations of the fine print of the July 9 proposed rulemaking, any softening of compliance standards and customers’ engine preferences.
However, “let’s see exactly how it will play out now, because it has been a very recent development,” he said, having earlier noted that the parent company of Volvo Trucks North America and Mack Trucks was looking into what the implications of emissions noncompliance fees would be.
Volvo Group’s order intake in North America increased 122% year on year to 18,302 trucks in the most recent quarter from 8,243 trucks in Q2 2025.
VTNA orders totaled 10,329 trucks in the three months ending June 30, a 150% jump compared with 4,131 trucks a year earlier. Mack’s North American order intake in Q2 totaled 7,937 trucks, a 95% increase compared with 4,080 in the same period 12 months earlier.
On an industrywide basis, ACT Research data released July 3 showed June orders climbed more than 100% year over year for a fifth consecutive month.
North American Class 8 orders totaled 31,400 trucks in June, a 231% jump compared with the year-ago period, preliminary ACT data shows. Orders rose year over year in June for a seventh straight month.
But groupwide Q2 sales in North America decreased 6% year over year to 12,223 trucks from 12,981 in the year-ago period.
VTNA sales rose 10% in the most recent quarter to 5,489 trucks from 4,998 a year earlier, but Mack sales in North America fell 16% to 6,708 trucks from 7,940.
As a result, Volvo Group is maintaining its North American Class 8 retail sales forecast of 265,000 trucks.
“Order levels have been elevated in recent months while [the] retail sales pace … is expected to gain momentum in the second half of the year. Any EPA ’27 pre-buy is included in our current view, but it means that we need really now to get deliveries out during the last part of the year here,” Lundstedt said.
VTNA and Mack’s flagship Dublin and Macungie plants in Virginia and Pennsylvania, respectively, should be able to cope with the demand, even as operations at Volvo Group’s new Monterrey manufacturing facility in Mexico ramp up, the executive said.
Image
A Mack Pioneer and Anthem. (Mack Trucks)
A first batch of test vehicles was built at the Monterrey site by the start of June, and the first trucks for customers are now complete, Volvo Group said in its Q2 report. The ramp-up of production will be gradual during 2026 and 2027, it noted.
Both VTNA and Mack revamped their on-highway portfolios over the past couple of years. The overhaul, plus $700 million spent on building the Monterrey plant, is intended to support Volvo Group ambitions to win a 25% share of the North American heavy-duty truck market by 2030.
Through May, VTNA’s heavy-duty truck market share grew to 8.6% from 7.6% a year earlier, and Mack’s market share grew to 8.4% from 7.3%.
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“Volvo Trucks are back on the right track to regain gradually their position, and further support from over-the-road or the sleeper segments is expected for Volvo,” Lunstedt said.
Meanwhile, Volvo Group sold 55,687 trucks globally in the most recent quarter, a 5.5% increase compared with 52,764 trucks a year earlier.
Volvo Group added 63,412 trucks to its order book in Q2, a jump of 32.8% from 47,761 trucks in the year-ago period.
As a result, Volvo Group’s net profit rose 37.9% year over year to $1.07 billion in the most recent quarter from $780 million in Q2 2025. Volvo Group reports earnings in Swedish kroner, and currency conversions were correct as of July 17.
That increase in profit came despite headwinds from U.S. tariff costs, higher freight and material costs, and a May emissions-related settlement with the California Air Resources Board. The Q2 tariff impact was $124.5 million, with just over half of that from Volvo Construction Equipment.
