Cummins Confidential : Cummins Does “Net Zero” Like a Priest Does Celibacy – Peeling off the SMMT Gloss

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Cummins has popped up in SMMT this week to do what Cummins always does in polite company: smile, say “decarbonisation” twelve times, and quietly keep a diesel engine warming in the alley like a getaway car. The interview is a soft-lit confessional where they talk about hydrogen miracles, Euro-7 sainthood, and apprenticeship halos. But if you read it with your eyes open, it’s not a sermon. It’s an alibi.

This is Cummins trying to sound like the future while still smelling like the past. Like a man telling his wife he’s switched to menthols and asking for applause, then breaking the cigar case out once she’s gone to bed.

Let’s open the hymnal and translate the bullshit.

The Darlington Temple: £13m Of Holy Hardware

Cummins is proud of its new powertrain test facility in Darlington. You can tell because they keep repeating the price tag like a toddler waving a new toy. £13 million. Two storeys. Advanced dynamometers. “One of the few in Europe”. Real-world testing from SUVs to 44-ton trucks and double-deckers.

Fine. It’s a serious bit of kit. Darlington has always been Cummins’ UK cathedral of combustion. But notice the language. “Fuel agnostic”. “Wide range of technologies”. “Advanced diesel”. “Natural gas”. “Zero-carbon hydrogen”. “Battery electric”. The lot, bundled into one happy bowl like a buffet where nobody has to admit what they actually came for.

Because the truth is this: Darlington’s new lab is not a clean-air monastery. It’s a survival bunker for internal combustion. A place where Cummins can keep perfecting diesel, then call it “innovation” because the brochure has a hydrogen headline stapled on top.

They’re building the tools to ride Euro-7 and Heavy-Duty CO2 rules without surrendering their favourite habit. It’s not repentance. It’s tactical camouflage.

Hydrogen Engine: The “Miracle” With a Combustion Accent

Jonathan Atkinson talks about the B6.7H hydrogen internal combustion engine like it’s the Second Coming. A spark-ignited platform, “99% reduction in tailpipe carbon”, “ultra-low NOx”, diesel-comparable performance, easy vehicle integration, scalable to heavy duty.

Here’s what that really means. Cummins has taken a diesel-shaped brain and taught it a new prayer. Hydrogen ICE is the same old church with a different choir. They love it because it lets them stay in the combustion business while pretending they’ve moved on to higher ground. It’s the theological loophole of decarbonisation.

And hydrogen itself is not a magic spell. Most hydrogen on Earth is still made from fossil gas. The “zero-carbon hydrogen” line is a promissory note, not a reality. Cummins sells the dream now, and lets the grid, the supply chain, and your lungs deal with the practicalities later. Critics argue it’s inefficient, with NOx emissions that can rival diesel in real-world use. This isn’t faith. It’s marketing with incense.

Project Brunel: The Saints, The Sponsorship, The Story

They name-drop Project Brunel and the partners like a prayer roll. Johnson Matthey on aftertreatment, PHINIA on hydrogen injection, Zircotec on barrier coatings, match-funded by the UK government, facilitated by APC.

It’s a nice consortium. It’s also classic Cummins theatre. Wrap combustion in a British industrial collaboration narrative, sprinkle in “government match funding”, and you get a ready-made righteousness cloak. Everybody’s invited to clap for the “transition”, even though the transition keeps leading back to the same altar.

It’s like a pub crawl advertised as a wellness retreat because you have a glass of water between pints.

Euro-7 Talk: The Confession Without the Sin

Atkinson says they need “ultra-low emissions in real-world conditions”. The facility helps them make “precise, data-driven decisions”. They’re preparing for tighter rules.

Good. But Cummins has form. They got caught with defeat devices in the US, allegedly installing software on hundreds of thousands of engines to cheat emissions tests, and paid a record $1.675 billion penalty. And still, they speak about emissions like it’s a new discovery rather than a crime scene they just walked out of.

So when you hear “real-world ultra-low emissions”, don’t picture saints. Picture lawyers. Picture engineers being told to hit a compliance target while sales keeps a diesel pipeline fat and warm. Cummins doesn’t hate regulation. It loves regulation. Regulation is the theatre backdrop that makes their “clean diesel” act look heroic.

Apprenticeships And Halo Polish

They finish on the youth angle. Apprenticeships. Internships. Placements. “Best 100 Apprenticeship Employers”. The ritual closing hymn.

Sure, opportunities matter. But Cummins has always used young people as PR kindling. Every time they get heat for the culture, the alleged discrimination cases – like the gender pay lawsuits settled with the EEOC – out comes a fresh photo of smiling trainees in PPE. The line is always the same: “We invest in people”. It’s a corporate cuddle blanket thrown over a dog kennel on fire.

This is inclusivity washing in a hard hat.

The Point

This SMMT piece is Cummins doing what Cummins does best: turning complexity into a fairy tale, then selling the fairy tale as leadership.

Darlington is not proof of a moral awakening. It’s proof Cummins is sharpening every tool it needs to keep internal combustion alive into the next decade while chanting “net zero” like a monk who still sleeps with a pistol under the pillow.

Hydrogen ICE is not a clean break. It’s combustion’s witness protection programme.

And apprenticeships are not absolution. They’re a screen wipe for a company that has never been honest about the cost of its business model.

Cummins wants you to see a future-focused innovator. What you’re really seeing is a diesel empire learning new hymns so the congregation won’t notice the smoke.

Lee Thompson – Founder, The Cummins Accountability Project

Sources

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