Tesla aims to produce 50,000 electric trucks per year
- Tesla has started production of its fully electric truck called Semi at its Texas plant in Austin. It is the first time a carmaker has mass-produced a truck with such an engine. The downside to a fully electric truck is that you need a large-capacity battery to drive long distances with heavy loads without having to stop at a charging station. However, it is easier to install heavy batteries in a truck whose weight is already high and, more importantly, that can have large spaces to hold those batteries.
- For this reason, Tesla believes in the development of the battery electric truck market, even if other carmakers choose the hydrogen-powered fuel cell truck solution.
- Tesla argues that the truck carmakers that have ventured into the fully electric experiment have started from a diesel-powered truck and converted it to electric, while the Tesla truck is originally designed as an electric truck from the start. The stated range is 800 kilometers, compared to 400 kilometers for existing trucks that have been converted to electric drive.
- For Tesla, the advantage of an electric truck is its quietness, no pollution when driving the vehicle and the comfort. The carmaker expects 50,000 sales of its truck in 2024, which would represent 1.25% of global truck sales, as global production of trucks (vehicles over 3.5 tons) reaches a volume of about 4 million units each year, according to OICA (International Organization of Automobile carmakers).