COMMENT: Truck diesel advances should allay operators’ downsizing doubts

Only three weeks before he was ousted as Volvo Group Chief Executive, Olof Persson made a press presentation at the Mid-America Trucking Show (MATS) in Louisville, Kentucky, where he predicted likely future developments in truck engine technology. He said ‘engines can get smaller and more powerful’, dismissing the popular adage that ‘there is no replacement for displacement’. “Actually,” he said, “there is a replacement for displacement; it’s called innovation.”