Well I like bashing on Tesla and Musk just as much as the next guy. But there are also a lot of anti EV sentiments in the article which aren’t warranted in my opinion.
There are other EV truck producers and use cases where EV trucks actually work. Obviously long haul isn’t one of those use cases and a lot of what Tesla said about the Tesla truck makes no sense at all.
For example a large company near me has multiple locations spread throughout the area. They have trucks running around between locations all the time. Recently a large part of their fleet has been replaced with 100% electric semi’s. They have their own big ass charging station at one of their facilities, with about a 20 charging docks. They haul big and heavy stuff, but the average trip is only around 30 miles. Since they have their own fleet, they just have extra trucks, so a part of the fleet is charging all the time. This is pretty much an ideal scenario for EV trucks. The trucks are made by a large local truck manufacturer, with a good track record.
The first time I saw an electric semi my mind was blown. It looked like a regular truck, it did all the things a regular truck does, except it didn’t make any noise at all.
Using electric trucks for trips of 400+ miles doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Better invest in a better rail system, too bad Elon spoiled that with his loopy bullshit.
Electric trucks for long haul can make sense. However, this is highly dependent on overhead lines for trucks getting mass adoption. Near where I live in Germany there is a test track on a section of the autobahn, allowing specially equipped trucks to run on external power like trains, fully electric, on the autobahn and continue on their own power on their way on or off the autobahn.
To my knowledge, the test trucks are hybrids that run with regular diesel, most of the time, however, if this ever gets rolled out in more places, maybe the entire autobahn network, it probably wouldn’t be too difficult to have the trucks be battery powered while they’re not on the autobahn and have them be powered externally and maybe even charging while they’re on the autobahn.
The main issue with this system is the cost associated with electrifying large parts the road network but the benefit of massively reducing carbon emissions and perhaps lower cost of electricity compared to fossil fuels might make it a good investment in the long term.
Well I like bashing on Tesla and Musk just as much as the next guy. But there are also a lot of anti EV sentiments in the article which aren’t warranted in my opinion.
Pretty much, seemingly a mix of apparently genuine factual concerns, snide (but accurate) remarks about PepsiCo, and stupid anti-EV sentiments.
I wish Tesla’d invested more energy into this project. But economically, it probably doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to produce semis when they could produce cars instead which have much better scale and margin. Car buyers are much happier to pay for useless frills (like the 20" rims that only serve to increase fuel consumption) than ROI-focused truck buyers.
Using electric trucks for trips of 400+ miles doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Better invest in a better rail system, too bad Elon spoiled that with his loopy bullshit.
Right but that would be a systemic solution. Or in other words: Something that a government would have to commit to, whereas private companies are much happier to just add another hack to a suboptimal system. Roads exist already, and (today!) they can be used in much more flexible way than rail.
Electric semis make the most sense because they can get a fresh battery (on the trailer) every time they get a new load. Just make sure they have a load going both ways.
