STLA Stellantis NV

By Mike Colias and Chester Dawson 

Big U.S. auto makers are building more fuel-efficient engines for pickup trucks, even as the Trump administration -- spurred by the industry's complaints -- moves to relax gas-mileage standards intended to fight emissions.

General Motors Co., Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV and Ford Motor Co. are betting people want both better gas mileage and raw horsepower from their trucks, the most lucrative category in the auto industry. That is prompting them to innovate.

GM this fall will introduce a revamped Chevy Silverado full-size pickup with an engine smaller than what's under the hood of some Toyota Camry midsize sedans. Fiat-Chrysler is equipping its new Ram 1500 pickup truck with a hybrid engine. And Ford, which four years ago pioneered the use of aluminum body panels in pickup trucks to save weight and fuel, plans its own hybrid truck.

Although auto makers have long argued that existing Obama-era standards are too stringent and lobbied for them to be relaxed, they are taking a longer-term and more global view when developing new engine technologies. Industry officials says they are unlikely to abandon them, even if the White House formally eases fuel-economy standards, as expected.

Auto makers have several incentives for embracing fuel efficiency. Next-generation truck engines won't hit showrooms for several years, by which time regulations may change again. The engines and new technologies likely also may be used in other types of vehicles, some destined for markets with tougher regulations than the Trump administration is eyeing.

At GM, engineers are following the company's stated long-term goal of reducing tail-pipe emissions to zero, said Mark Reuss, GM's head of product development. "Our people understand that is the end game, even if they're working on a pickup truck instead of an electric vehicle," he said.

The threat of higher gas prices, which caused demand for pickups to crater in 2007, has also led auto makers to pivot from their longstanding use of big, gas-guzzling engines for big vehicles. Their challenge is to do so without sacrificing the capability of larger vehicles to haul equipment, tow campers and navigate difficult terrain, especially because trucks and sport-utility vehicles have become the industry's best sellers and biggest money makers.

And then there's California, auto makers' largest domestic market. The state intends to adhere to the Obama-era standards irrespective of any move by the Trump administration -- a stance that would effectively force auto makers to adopt the tougher standard to avoid being shut out. Big foreign markets such as China also are moving ahead with tighter regulations on emissions and fuel economy, which will push auto makers to wring more efficiency from existing vehicles and expand electric-vehicle offerings.

"The auto makers know they need to future-proof these trucks from a fuel-economy standpoint for whatever political or regulatory environment might come next," said Dave Sullivan, an analyst at research firm AutoPacific Inc.

A decade ago, high gas prices and regulation prodded vehicle makers to boost fuel efficiency. The average combined fuel economy rating of pickups in 2017 was 18.9 miles per gallon, behind the 30 miles per gallon for sedans but an improvement over the 16.1 miles per gallon 10 years ago, according to Environmental Protection Agency data. The Obama-era standards were designed to push the industry to sell light vehicles averaging more than 50 miles per gallon by 2025.

Full-size pickups, big SUVs and crossovers have benefited from innovations that eke out more miles per gallon from gasoline-powered engines. They include greater use of turbochargers that recycle exhaust energy and lightweight materials, said Sujit Jain, who heads the North American engine and passenger car business at German parts supplier Robert Bosch GmbH. "You can get everything you want from a traditional engine -- high power, high torque and greater fuel efficiency."

The revamped Silverado will have an optional 2.7-liter, four-cylinder turbocharged engine, which will likely deliver several more miles per gallon than its 6.2-liter, eight-cylinder counterpart. The downsized engine was made possible by GM's use of lighter materials such as aluminum and carbon fiber, which helped reduce the truck's weight by as much as 450 pounds.

Ford began selling a diesel F-150 pickup truck this spring that achieves what some industry experts call the Holy Grail of fuel economy for trucks -- an estimated 30 miles per gallon in highway driving. That's better than the 27 mpg rating on the 2018 Ford Taurus family sedan, even though the truck outweighs the car by about 1,000 pounds.

Ford has touted the F-150's "best in class" fuel economy among full-size pickups and says it is the most efficient engine for owners who frequently haul heavy loads. Ford product chief Hau Thai-Tang said even a few years ago, customers wouldn't have imagined a full-size pickup could get 30 miles per gallon in highway driving.

Mike Manley, head of Fiat Chrysler's Ram truck brand, said at the debut of the new Ram pickup in January that he expects "at least 10% improvement" in fuel-economy ratings compared with the old model.

GM and Fiat Chrysler also have equipped their latest trucks with systems that automatically shut off the engine when the vehicle comes to a stop and restarts it when the driver's foot lifts off the brake. Every new Ram 1500 with a V6 engine will come standard with a so-called "mild hybrid" 48-volt battery for those re-starts and also provide a power boost to the engine when needed.

Another trick GM used in its new Silverado relies on fine-tuning engine software. The truck uses an algorithm co-developed by Tula Technology Inc., a San Jose, Calif., startup, to improve efficiency by deactivating some cylinders when cruising or coasting.

Write to Mike Colias at Mike.Colias@wsj.com and Chester Dawson at chester.dawson@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

June 17, 2018 08:14 ET (12:14 GMT)

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