Picture: Tesla
Elon Musk has announced that Tesla has started the production of an all-electric class 9 truck with deliveries that will begin on the 1st December to Pepsi. The truck was unveiled back in 2017, with no plans to come until 2019. The program was delayed for a number of years and production was not expected to begin until 2023.
Musk stated that the vehicle has a range of 500 miles on a single charge. The trucks are said to be produced in Nevada, near Tesla’s Gigafactory.
Tesla claims the Semi can charge from 0 to 400 miles in 30 minutes which is the legally required break time for truckers in the US. These charge times are due to Tesla’s new “megachargers,” which are supplied by solar energy rather than the national electric grid, resulting in guaranteed, fixed electric charge rates
Musk released the news in a tweet:
After the launch of Tesla Semi in 2017, Pepsi placed one of the biggest orders for Tesla Semi: 100 electric trucks. The company planned to use 15 of those trucks for a project to turn its Frito-Lay Modesto, California, site into a zero-emission facility.
Last year in a report made by the company, Tesla pushed the production of the Semi truck program to 2022 due to supply chain issues and limited availability of battery cells.
The delays have clearly not prevented the company from landing reservations as many high-profile companies have reserved the trucks including Anheuser-Busch, Pepsi, Walmart and UPS.
