Electric Cars: Can they finally become popular in the United States?

[ATtiny85]

Thanks @NorCal , thanks @dandarc for the data/anecdote points and information. We are hopefully at least a decade away from needing to replace a vehicle and I will optimistically assume that a bunch of this will be cleared by then. But of course things happen and all these little points enter into my decision analysis. I try to plan the next vehicle well in advance of needing one, though it is mostly just trying to stay a bit in the loop with things.

The supporting infrastructure for technology is a fascinating subject. I was working with Caterpillar on the early days of the Tier 4 interim off-highway emissions regulations (~2011 implementation depending on power level). In a meeting with some decently higher ups in the engine division in 2006 one of the managers stated "we are going with an SCR/DEF solution; however, we are NOT going to put in the infrastructure for DEF availability in the US. " They pivoted in early 2008 away from SCR/DEF for that emissions tier level and I always wondered how many nails were in the coffin. The DEF infrastructure was not projected to be robust for some time. The general engine tech (at CAT) was not quite maturing at the proper rate. The supply base for the catalysts was still a few years from being ready. And so on. But I always remember that line about the supply chain.

[NorCal]

Thanks @NorCal , thanks @dandarc for the data/anecdote points and information. We are hopefully at least a decade away from needing to replace a vehicle and I will optimistically assume that a bunch of this will be cleared by then. But of course things happen and all these little points enter into my decision analysis. I try to plan the next vehicle well in advance of needing one, though it is mostly just trying to stay a bit in the loop with things.

The supporting infrastructure for technology is a fascinating subject. I was working with Caterpillar on the early days of the Tier 4 interim off-highway emissions regulations (~2011 implementation depending on power level). In a meeting with some decently higher ups in the engine division in 2006 one of the managers stated "we are going with an SCR/DEF solution; however, we are NOT going to put in the infrastructure for DEF availability in the US. " They pivoted in early 2008 away from SCR/DEF for that emissions tier level and I always wondered how many nails were in the coffin. The DEF infrastructure was not projected to be robust for some time. The general engine tech (at CAT) was not quite maturing at the proper rate. The supply base for the catalysts was still a few years from being ready. And so on. But I always remember that line about the supply chain.

If you're a decade away, things will be VERY different.  There's a lot of startups working on different battery chemistries and layouts.  While battery R&D is notorious for running into dead ends (and is a multi-decade process), there's a large enough pool of promising advancements and late-stage development that it's almost guaranteed something will show a marked improvement.  Heck, Amprius is getting ready to build a factory for batteries that have an energy density high enough to theoretically support electrified aviation.  Maybe they will make it work, maybe they won't.  But there's also Sila Nano, Quantumscape, Solid Power, and plenty of others I'm only tangentially aware of.

Probably the biggest difference between EV's of today and EV's of tomorrow is charging speed.  What might take 30-40 minutes in charging today might take 5-15 minutes in the EV of the future.  This creates even bigger implications for expanding grid infrastructure.  But it would open up a whole world of opportunities for electrified transport.

[LennStar]

Li-ion batteries are near their physical limit. You can squeeze out a bit more with better surrounding material etc. but I doubt their energy density will double once more.

Similar it is for loading. Every loading will have losses - which means heat. They already need to be cooled for fast charge. What do you want to do with double the density and 3 times loading speed? That is 6 times heat in a more denser, means harder to cool package.
And we are talking cars here, not "transports" as in goods. There the batteries need to be a lot bigger (10times?), at least for the current model of driving nearly everything in a truck for basically every distance.

[JLee]

Li-ion batteries are near their physical limit. You can squeeze out a bit more with better surrounding material etc. but I doubt their energy density will double once more.

Similar it is for loading. Every loading will have losses - which means heat. They already need to be cooled for fast charge. What do you want to do with double the density and 3 times loading speed? That is 6 times heat in a more denser, means harder to cool package.
And we are talking cars here, not "transports" as in goods. There the batteries need to be a lot bigger (10times?), at least for the current model of driving nearly everything in a truck for basically every distance.

I remember reading an article many years ago talking hard drive density - at the time, 80GB drives were the largest on the market and this article was saying that due to xyz reasons, we were hitting the ceiling of what was possible to store on magnetic platter drives.  Today's hard drives are exceeding 20TB, or over 250x what was allegedly the ceiling previously.

Technology has ways of progressing - we're not there yet, but it's only recently that a lot of attention has gone into battery development.  I'm curious to see where we are a decade from now.

[nereo]

Li-ion batteries are near their physical limit. You can squeeze out a bit more with better surrounding material etc. but I doubt their energy density will double once more.

Similar it is for loading. Every loading will have losses - which means heat. They already need to be cooled for fast charge. What do you want to do with double the density and 3 times loading speed? That is 6 times heat in a more denser, means harder to cool package.
And we are talking cars here, not "transports" as in goods. There the batteries need to be a lot bigger (10times?), at least for the current model of driving nearly everything in a truck for basically every distance.

One aspect you are missing is that different battery chemistries have vastly different thermal tolerances.  Li-ion batteries are particularly finicky about getting too hot; it really harms the battery when it gets above 45ºC.  Other chemistries do much better, but (presently) at the expense of energy density.  Broadly speaking there are two mechanical approaches to faster charging batteries - better thermal management/cooling (which still has ample room fro improvement), but also battery chemistries that can tolerate higher temps without degradation.
Because Tdiff is the driving factor in thermal management, a battery that can tolerate 60ºC can cool 4x faster than Li-Ion at typical summertime temperatures.

[LennStar]

Li-ion batteries are near their physical limit. You can squeeze out a bit more with better surrounding material etc. but I doubt their energy density will double once more.

Similar it is for loading. Every loading will have losses - which means heat. They already need to be cooled for fast charge. What do you want to do with double the density and 3 times loading speed? That is 6 times heat in a more denser, means harder to cool package.
And we are talking cars here, not "transports" as in goods. There the batteries need to be a lot bigger (10times?), at least for the current model of driving nearly everything in a truck for basically every distance.

I remember reading an article many years ago talking hard drive density - at the time, 80GB drives were the largest on the market and this article was saying that due to xyz reasons, we were hitting the ceiling of what was possible to store on magnetic platter drives.  Today's hard drives are exceeding 20TB, or over 250x what was allegedly the ceiling previously.

Technology has ways of progressing - we're not there yet, but it's only recently that a lot of attention has gone into battery development.  I'm curious to see where we are a decade from now.

First of all that are 2 different things. For HDDs you only need to find new ways to make smaller work. But there is no way to make more electrons inhabit the same space outside some drastic measures (Ever heard of fusion energy? The only thing to solve there is how to keep ions in place, just like in batteries.)
And beside, the producers cheated. A 3TB disk you buy for your PC is just 3 disk with 1TB each packed together. The platters are close to the physical/economical limit for bits/space.

Similar thing for PV btw. That's why they are trying multi-layered PVs, organic PVs and so on. But those are new technologies.
Even the new technologies in view today are not gonna be revolutionary. Redox-flow, solid state... those might be cheaper. Or have more cycles. Or load faster or sometimes even several better stats. But nothing revolutionary that makes me think those are good enough for long range truck hauling.

[JLee]

Li-ion batteries are near their physical limit. You can squeeze out a bit more with better surrounding material etc. but I doubt their energy density will double once more.

Similar it is for loading. Every loading will have losses - which means heat. They already need to be cooled for fast charge. What do you want to do with double the density and 3 times loading speed? That is 6 times heat in a more denser, means harder to cool package.
And we are talking cars here, not "transports" as in goods. There the batteries need to be a lot bigger (10times?), at least for the current model of driving nearly everything in a truck for basically every distance.

I remember reading an article many years ago talking hard drive density - at the time, 80GB drives were the largest on the market and this article was saying that due to xyz reasons, we were hitting the ceiling of what was possible to store on magnetic platter drives.  Today's hard drives are exceeding 20TB, or over 250x what was allegedly the ceiling previously.

Technology has ways of progressing - we're not there yet, but it's only recently that a lot of attention has gone into battery development.  I'm curious to see where we are a decade from now.

First of all that are 2 different things. For HDDs you only need to find new ways to make smaller work. But there is no way to make more electrons inhabit the same space outside some drastic measures (Ever heard of fusion energy? The only thing to solve there is how to keep ions in place, just like in batteries.)
And beside, the producers cheated. A 3TB disk you buy for your PC is just 3 disk with 1TB each packed together. The platters are close to the physical/economical limit for bits/space.

Similar thing for PV btw. That's why they are trying multi-layered PVs, organic PVs and so on. But those are new technologies.
Even the new technologies in view today are not gonna be revolutionary. Redox-flow, solid state... those might be cheaper. Or have more cycles. Or load faster or sometimes even several better stats. But nothing revolutionary that makes me think those are good enough for long range truck hauling.

I'm not going to pretend to be smarter than all the scientists working on it, but even lithium batteries have made remarkable progress - nevermind any other technologies that are coming.

https://www.energy.gov/eere/vehicles/articles/fotw-1234-april-18-2022-volumetric-energy-density-lithium-ion-batteries

Cheating or not, a 20TB drive is 250 times what was the "most possible" a couple decades ago.

[NorCal]

Li-ion batteries are near their physical limit. You can squeeze out a bit more with better surrounding material etc. but I doubt their energy density will double once more.

Similar it is for loading. Every loading will have losses - which means heat. They already need to be cooled for fast charge. What do you want to do with double the density and 3 times loading speed? That is 6 times heat in a more denser, means harder to cool package.
And we are talking cars here, not "transports" as in goods. There the batteries need to be a lot bigger (10times?), at least for the current model of driving nearly everything in a truck for basically every distance.

I'm no physicist, and I take most corporate marketing claims with a bag full of salt.  There's no BS better than corporate marketing.

But I still see plenty of promise here, along with a number of dead ends.  If we just look at the startups that are actually building factories for their technologies and avoid things that are still in the science lab, we have:

Current Lithium Ion Technology:  ~275Wh/kg.  With some claiming it might get to ~300Wh/kg

Here's the claims I see from companies that have moved out of the test phase and into some level of manufacturing build out:
-Sila Nano: claims 20% improvement in energy density in existing battery formats from replacing graphite anodes with silicon anodes.  It looks like they're scheduled to put this in a future Mercedes vehicle, and it sounds fully compatible with existing cathode chemistry.
-Amprius: Has some existing products in the ~370Wh-450Wh/kg range, and demonstrated a 500wh/kg battery in the lab.  They also claim incredibly fast charging speeds.
-Quantumscape: The info on their website reported energy density on a volume basis instead of a weight basis (probably for self serving reasons).  They were also a little more vague about what they can accomplish today versus their goals.  But they're talking about a ~40% improvement in energy density when measured on a volume basis.
-Solid Power: They list three potential versions on their website at 390/440/560Wh per kg.  They are in the process of building out a factory now.  This format also allows for much faster charging speeds.

While energy density is a key metric, a lot of the other exciting advancements are around the tradeoffs that go into the tradeoffs made between different chemistries.  We could see meaningful advancements in battery life, charge speed, effective operating temperature, and fire safety.  Or at least see versions optimized for different purposes.  Reading between the lines, it sounds like the solid-state formats will have much less waste heat during charging.

[Tyson]

Li-ion batteries are near their physical limit. You can squeeze out a bit more with better surrounding material etc. but I doubt their energy density will double once more.

Similar it is for loading. Every loading will have losses - which means heat. They already need to be cooled for fast charge. What do you want to do with double the density and 3 times loading speed? That is 6 times heat in a more denser, means harder to cool package.
And we are talking cars here, not "transports" as in goods. There the batteries need to be a lot bigger (10times?), at least for the current model of driving nearly everything in a truck for basically every distance.

I remember reading an article many years ago talking hard drive density - at the time, 80GB drives were the largest on the market and this article was saying that due to xyz reasons, we were hitting the ceiling of what was possible to store on magnetic platter drives.  Today's hard drives are exceeding 20TB, or over 250x what was allegedly the ceiling previously.

Technology has ways of progressing - we're not there yet, but it's only recently that a lot of attention has gone into battery development.  I'm curious to see where we are a decade from now.

First of all that are 2 different things. For HDDs you only need to find new ways to make smaller work. But there is no way to make more electrons inhabit the same space outside some drastic measures (Ever heard of fusion energy? The only thing to solve there is how to keep ions in place, just like in batteries.)
And beside, the producers cheated. A 3TB disk you buy for your PC is just 3 disk with 1TB each packed together. The platters are close to the physical/economical limit for bits/space.

Similar thing for PV btw. That's why they are trying multi-layered PVs, organic PVs and so on. But those are new technologies.
Even the new technologies in view today are not gonna be revolutionary. Redox-flow, solid state... those might be cheaper. Or have more cycles. Or load faster or sometimes even several better stats. But nothing revolutionary that makes me think those are good enough for long range truck hauling.

Tesla Semi already has the ability to do 500 miles fully loaded. 

[LennStar]

Even the new technologies in view today are not gonna be revolutionary. Redox-flow, solid state... those might be cheaper. Or have more cycles. Or load faster or sometimes even several better stats. But nothing revolutionary that makes me think those are good enough for long range truck hauling.

Tesla Semi already has the ability to do 500 miles fully loaded.

1) I believe that when I see it done in the winter mountains.
2) I was talking about freight, not your apple pie when you visit grandma. Several tons of freight.
3) Does the Tesla Semi come for 30K? because that's roughly what it needs to be when it should scale to a 7,5t truck that is competitive. Not to mention that every highway station would need at least 100 chargers to charge the trucks up overnight. (And I am not even counting those that stand outside the parking spots)

[JLee]

Even the new technologies in view today are not gonna be revolutionary. Redox-flow, solid state... those might be cheaper. Or have more cycles. Or load faster or sometimes even several better stats. But nothing revolutionary that makes me think those are good enough for long range truck hauling.

Tesla Semi already has the ability to do 500 miles fully loaded.

1) I believe that when I see it done in the winter mountains.
2) I was talking about freight, not your apple pie when you visit grandma. Several tons of freight.
3) Does the Tesla Semi come for 30K? because that's roughly what it needs to be when it should scale to a 7,5t truck that is competitive. Not to mention that every highway station would need at least 100 chargers to charge the trucks up overnight. (And I am not even counting those that stand outside the parking spots)

What on earth are you talking about?

[AlanStache]

Even the new technologies in view today are not gonna be revolutionary. Redox-flow, solid state... those might be cheaper. Or have more cycles. Or load faster or sometimes even several better stats. But nothing revolutionary that makes me think those are good enough for long range truck hauling.

Tesla Semi already has the ability to do 500 miles fully loaded.

1) I believe that when I see it done in the winter mountains.
2) I was talking about freight, not your apple pie when you visit grandma. Several tons of freight.
3) Does the Tesla Semi come for 30K? because that's roughly what it needs to be when it should scale to a 7,5t truck that is competitive. Not to mention that every highway station would need at least 100 chargers to charge the trucks up overnight. (And I am not even counting those that stand outside the parking spots)

What I have heard is that they will be charged at either (or one?) end of a set back and forth route between two sites.  Like with cars they will have higher up front costs but lower fuel and maintenance. 

"Electric vehicles have to do A... no they really need to do B, ... I mean C, ... M!!! they need to do M!!!! ..... why cant they do X yet?"

Not all vehicles need to be suitable for all tasks.  An F350 would not in any way work in my life.  I am not sure I could use an F350 to go get groceries, the local roads and parking at the shops are to small. 

[Tyson]

Even the new technologies in view today are not gonna be revolutionary. Redox-flow, solid state... those might be cheaper. Or have more cycles. Or load faster or sometimes even several better stats. But nothing revolutionary that makes me think those are good enough for long range truck hauling.

Tesla Semi already has the ability to do 500 miles fully loaded.

1) I believe that when I see it done in the winter mountains.
2) I was talking about freight, not your apple pie when you visit grandma. Several tons of freight.
3) Does the Tesla Semi come for 30K? because that's roughly what it needs to be when it should scale to a 7,5t truck that is competitive. Not to mention that every highway station would need at least 100 chargers to charge the trucks up overnight. (And I am not even counting those that stand outside the parking spots)

Fully loaded?  Yes.

Mountains with 4000 feet of elevation?  Yes.

500 miles on a single charge?  Yes.

Here's the article and the video - https://insideevs.com/news/624672/watch-fully-loaded-tesla-semi-cover-500-miles-on-single-charge/

[bacchi]

Even the new technologies in view today are not gonna be revolutionary. Redox-flow, solid state... those might be cheaper. Or have more cycles. Or load faster or sometimes even several better stats. But nothing revolutionary that makes me think those are good enough for long range truck hauling.

Tesla Semi already has the ability to do 500 miles fully loaded.

1) I believe that when I see it done in the winter mountains.
2) I was talking about freight, not your apple pie when you visit grandma. Several tons of freight.
3) Does the Tesla Semi come for 30K? because that's roughly what it needs to be when it should scale to a 7,5t truck that is competitive. Not to mention that every highway station would need at least 100 chargers to charge the trucks up overnight. (And I am not even counting those that stand outside the parking spots)

Fully loaded?  Yes.

Mountains with 4000 feet of elevation?  Yes.

500 miles on a single charge?  Yes.

Here's the article and the video - https://insideevs.com/news/624672/watch-fully-loaded-tesla-semi-cover-500-miles-on-single-charge/

Their car range was deceptively off by ~20%. Should we trust that "fully loaded" from Tesla means 80k/82k? How much of that is cargo and how much is the unknown cab and battery weight?

Or maybe "fully loaded" from Tesla means by volume and/or just loaded enough to make it to the distribution center without a charge?

Besides the promotional videos and statements, has anyone independently loaded up a Tesla semi to 82k pounds? And why not?

[Tyson]

Even the new technologies in view today are not gonna be revolutionary. Redox-flow, solid state... those might be cheaper. Or have more cycles. Or load faster or sometimes even several better stats. But nothing revolutionary that makes me think those are good enough for long range truck hauling.

Tesla Semi already has the ability to do 500 miles fully loaded.

1) I believe that when I see it done in the winter mountains.
2) I was talking about freight, not your apple pie when you visit grandma. Several tons of freight.
3) Does the Tesla Semi come for 30K? because that's roughly what it needs to be when it should scale to a 7,5t truck that is competitive. Not to mention that every highway station would need at least 100 chargers to charge the trucks up overnight. (And I am not even counting those that stand outside the parking spots)

Fully loaded?  Yes.

Mountains with 4000 feet of elevation?  Yes.

500 miles on a single charge?  Yes.

Here's the article and the video - https://insideevs.com/news/624672/watch-fully-loaded-tesla-semi-cover-500-miles-on-single-charge/

Their car range was deceptively off by ~20%. Should we trust that "fully loaded" from Tesla means 80k/82k? How much of that is cargo and how much is the unknown cab and battery weight?

Or maybe "fully loaded" from Tesla means by volume and/or just loaded enough to make it to the distribution center without a charge?

Besides the promotional videos and statements, has anyone independently loaded up a Tesla semi to 82k pounds? And why not?

Pepsi bought a bunch of the Semi's and they talk about fully loading them and getting 450 miles, here - https://runonless.com/roled-profiles/pepsico/

I think this is pretty damn cool.   People should be excited about this.

[Paper Chaser]

Tesla Semi already has the ability to do 500 miles fully loaded.

1) I believe that when I see it done in the winter mountains.
2) I was talking about freight, not your apple pie when you visit grandma. Several tons of freight.
3) Does the Tesla Semi come for 30K? because that's roughly what it needs to be when it should scale to a 7,5t truck that is competitive. Not to mention that every highway station would need at least 100 chargers to charge the trucks up overnight. (And I am not even counting those that stand outside the parking spots)

Fully loaded?  Yes.

Mountains with 4000 feet of elevation?  Yes.

500 miles on a single charge?  Yes.

Here's the article and the video - https://insideevs.com/news/624672/watch-fully-loaded-tesla-semi-cover-500-miles-on-single-charge/

Their car range was deceptively off by ~20%. Should we trust that "fully loaded" from Tesla means 80k/82k? How much of that is cargo and how much is the unknown cab and battery weight?

Or maybe "fully loaded" from Tesla means by volume and/or just loaded enough to make it to the distribution center without a charge?

Besides the promotional videos and statements, has anyone independently loaded up a Tesla semi to 82k pounds? And why not?

Pepsi bought a bunch of the Semi's and they talk about fully loading them and getting 450 miles, here - https://runonless.com/roled-profiles/pepsico/

I think this is pretty damn cool.   People should be excited about this.

Exciting new tech is nice, but like anything that comes to market, it has to be financially viable. Trucking companies care about getting as much freight as possible to it's destination on time, as inexpensively as possible. The Run On Less testing should provide a bit more insight, but until the weight and price of the Semi are known, it's not much more than a curiosity.

Pepsi is using 21 Tesla Semis in Sacramento. They got $15 million in state and local grants to buy the trucks and install chargers plus $40k in Federal rebates per vehicle:

https://www.sacbee.com/news/business/article274186280.html

Of the 21 trucks, 18 are used for local delivery routes that travel about 100 miles per day and return to a central depot for overnight charging:

https://insideevs.com/news/681061/here-how-pepsi-runs-its-21-tesla-semi-trucks-at-sacramento-depot/

While impressive, the 500 mile trip was done under ideal conditions, and with the second half being almost entirely downhill from 4000ft (lots of coasting and regen):



All of the primary trucking OEMs have EV options too. They can be great at completing work in certain duty cycles. Long haul isn't currently one of those duty cycles, and that doesn't mean they're financially viable. Pepsi/Frito Lay still use combustion trucks for actual long hauls (natural gas powered Volvos are highlighted in this article):

https://www.motortrend.com/reviews/tesla-semi-interior-review/

Tesla has chosen to put larger batteries in their electric Semi than the other manufacturers, which provides more headline grabbing range but increases cost and weight (reducing freight efficiency). Pepsi (or the taxpayers in this case) are paying for ~500 miles of battery capacity in trucks that are used for 100 mile routes. That's a lot of extra cost and weight.
500 miles point to point is cool, but it's a single route that was particularly advantageous, done under pretty ideal circumstances (at night with less traffic, cooler temps so no HVAC use, no precip to impact rolling resistance, etc) and had super expensive chargers at each end that were heavily or fully funded by tax dollars. That's a lot different than the way that most long haul trucking is currently done. And if most other trucking companies don't have the massive subsidy from local government paying for the trucks and chargers/electrical service upgrades, then the math probably gets pretty ugly. Oh, and the Tesla doesn't currently have a place for the driver to sleep which makes it a non-starter for most true "over the road" scenarios.

[nereo]

Regarding Tesla Semis: Most people are familiar with Teslas “superchargers”, their L3 charging network which is by far the most built out in NA.

For their commercial heavy trucks Tesla is adding “mega chargers” which can put out 750 kW of DC current or 3x more than the v3 superchargers.

[Paper Chaser]

Regarding Tesla Semis: Most people are familiar with Teslas “superchargers”, their L3 charging network which is by far the most built out in NA.

For their commercial heavy trucks Tesla is adding “mega chargers” which can put out 750 kW of DC current or 3x more than the v3 superchargers.

Yep. Way more power needed, which means way higher cost to install. And they seem to use a different connector than the NACS that Tesla prefers, so the Semi may not even be able to utilize the regular Supercharger network:

[Dancin'Dog]

The US is putting so much into transitioning to EV, but I hear almost nothing about mass transit.  Why don't we have high-speed rail in the US?  Our airports are busier than ever & it's a PITA to fly.  Will we ever have a bullet train running from Miami to Boston?  What magic is required to make that happen?  How many cars & planes could a modern rail system displace?  How much CO2 could one eliminate from being generated?

[Paper Chaser]

The US is putting so much into transitioning to EV, but I hear almost nothing about mass transit.  Why don't we have high-speed rail in the US?  Our airports are busier than ever & it's a PITA to fly.  Will we ever have a bullet train running from Miami to Boston?  What magic is required to make that happen?  How many cars & planes could a modern rail system displace?  How much CO2 could one eliminate from being generated?

The whole motivation is seemingly just about cleaning up consumption rather than changing lifestyle (can't risk hurting corporate profits!).

If leaders were truly motivated to reduce climate impacts, you'd hear a lot more about reducing consumption, a carbon tax, PHEVs to get as many EV miles driven with as few resources as possible, etc. Instead, they encourage us to spend a bunch more money to buy solar panels, new high efficiency appliances, and expensive EVs with massive batteries.

[pecunia]

The US is putting so much into transitioning to EV, but I hear almost nothing about mass transit.  Why don't we have high-speed rail in the US?  Our airports are busier than ever & it's a PITA to fly.  Will we ever have a bullet train running from Miami to Boston?  What magic is required to make that happen?  How many cars & planes could a modern rail system displace?  How much CO2 could one eliminate from being generated?

I don't think that alternative occurs to most.  Once one gets built, it may open a floodgate and more will follow.  If you build it they will come.

[Raenia]

The US is putting so much into transitioning to EV, but I hear almost nothing about mass transit.  Why don't we have high-speed rail in the US?  Our airports are busier than ever & it's a PITA to fly.  Will we ever have a bullet train running from Miami to Boston?  What magic is required to make that happen?  How many cars & planes could a modern rail system displace?  How much CO2 could one eliminate from being generated?

Right-of-way is a pretty big barrier to building new train infrastructure in the US. I would love to see high speed rail up the east coast, or even just DC to NYC, but I don't see it happening any time soon. Maybe with enough incentives, Amtrack could be induced to upgrade - they currently own most of the right of way on existing track in this region, so any plan to upgrade transit would have to have their buy-in. I'm in Philadelphia, and on several of our regional SEPTA lines, Amtrack has priority right of way over our own trains.

[AlanStache]

Paper Chaser I am not sure what you are getting at.  Tesla made a new type of widget, it is probably a bit better at some jobs with some misc advantages but cant do other jobs the existing widget can do.  Tesla has posted a 500 mile range with load, I think most people would round that down a bit and are aware that there is not a commercial truck charging infrastructure in the US. 

"While impressive, the 500 mile trip was done under ideal conditions, and with the second half being almost entirely downhill from 4000ft (lots of coasting and regen):"
But like you know from the image you posted that before the coasting down hill it drove up hill right?  You dont get free energy by going up a hill then back down. 

Is all this just over the use of the term "long haul"?  New tech enables new options that may or may not fit into existing classifications, would it make you happy to call the Tesla truck a "longer than short haul" - something else? 

[LennStar]

The US is putting so much into transitioning to EV, but I hear almost nothing about mass transit.  Why don't we have high-speed rail in the US?  Our airports are busier than ever & it's a PITA to fly.  Will we ever have a bullet train running from Miami to Boston?  What magic is required to make that happen?  How many cars & planes could a modern rail system displace?  How much CO2 could one eliminate from being generated?

Right-of-way is a pretty big barrier to building new train infrastructure in the US.

There is A LOT of multi-lane highways. Just transform 2 of them into rails. No land needed. Capacity doubled. Emissions quartered, costs halved.

"While impressive, the 500 mile trip was done under ideal conditions, and with the second half being almost entirely downhill from 4000ft (lots of coasting and regen):"
But like you know from the image you posted that before the coasting down hill it drove up hill right?  You dont get free energy by going up a hill then back down.

Is all this just over the use of the term "long haul"?  New tech enables new options that may or may not fit into existing classifications, would it make you happy to call the Tesla truck a "longer than short haul" - something else? 

I think that goes back to my "500 miles in the winter mountains".
You know, UP where you need especially much energy, not 95% DOWN, where you generate it. And in the winter where batteries have lower charge.
Because that is what companies will set as the baseline - a full day of driving in every possible condition.

[Raenia]

The US is putting so much into transitioning to EV, but I hear almost nothing about mass transit.  Why don't we have high-speed rail in the US?  Our airports are busier than ever & it's a PITA to fly.  Will we ever have a bullet train running from Miami to Boston?  What magic is required to make that happen?  How many cars & planes could a modern rail system displace?  How much CO2 could one eliminate from being generated?

Right-of-way is a pretty big barrier to building new train infrastructure in the US.

There is A LOT of multi-lane highways. Just transform 2 of them into rails. No land needed. Capacity doubled. Emissions quartered, costs halved.

It's not nearly that easy. Multi-lane highways generally aren't next to the existing train stations, so in addition to the infrastructure of the track, you'd need to build all the stations, plus the roads and parking to reach those stations. Even if you just want to make the station an exit off the highway, that's still a lot of expensive infrastructure and additional space, beyond just trading a lane of highway into a rail.

[Just Joe]

Tesla has chosen to put larger batteries in their electric Semi than the other manufacturers, which provides more headline grabbing range but increases cost and weight (reducing freight efficiency). Pepsi (or the taxpayers in this case) are paying for ~500 miles of battery capacity in trucks that are used for 100 mile routes. That's a lot of extra cost and weight.
500 miles point to point is cool, but it's a single route that was particularly advantageous, done under pretty ideal circumstances (at night with less traffic, cooler temps so no HVAC use, no precip to impact rolling resistance, etc) and had super expensive chargers at each end that were heavily or fully funded by tax dollars. That's a lot different than the way that most long haul trucking is currently done. And if most other trucking companies don't have the massive subsidy from local government paying for the trucks and chargers/electrical service upgrades, then the math probably gets pretty ugly. Oh, and the Tesla doesn't currently have a place for the driver to sleep which makes it a non-starter for most true "over the road" scenarios.

I'd like to see Pepsi's math. Perhaps they chose to buy a big battery so as it ages, they still have enough range for the application they have in mind. That is exactly why I bought a larger battery for my ebike and it has worked out grand. I'll do the same when I someday buy an BEV. If I have 250 mile range, and only really need 125 miles, it will take a long time for the battery degradation to reach the point where the battery no longer meets my needs. Much longer than wearing out a 150 mile range battery.

The math might support buying the larger battery than replacing a smaller battery sooner. Also, the larger battery spreads the chemical wear and tear over a greater number of cells. Each cells is being cycled less in the larger battery than the smaller one. That might also aid battery longevity.

All that said, I get the weight problem that a large BEV represents. 

[Just Joe]

It's not nearly that easy. Multi-lane highways generally aren't next to the existing train stations, so in addition to the infrastructure of the track, you'd need to build all the stations, plus the roads and parking to reach those stations. Even if you just want to make the station an exit off the highway, that's still a lot of expensive infrastructure and additional space, beyond just trading a lane of highway into a rail.

I've long thought that the interstate media would be the perfect place for passenger train rails. Then visited Chicago and lo and behold they did that with their commuter trains.

My imagined version has the trains running in the media with under passes to stations located in towns along the route.

We'd love to have a train to ride from here to the big metro where we attend concerts and other entertainment. Attend the concert and ride home to our town sleepy or tipsy with no problems. Right now I drive DW/teen/friends to the concerts and then park somewhere nearby. Grab a coffee and/or sandwich (use their wifi) and nap. Saves a little on parking, and I'm 100% good to drive while they gleefully recount how great the concert was and fall asleep.

[JLee]

Regarding Tesla Semis: Most people are familiar with Teslas “superchargers”, their L3 charging network which is by far the most built out in NA.

For their commercial heavy trucks Tesla is adding “mega chargers” which can put out 750 kW of DC current or 3x more than the v3 superchargers.

Yep. Way more power needed, which means way higher cost to install. And they seem to use a different connector than the NACS that Tesla prefers, so the Semi may not even be able to utilize the regular Supercharger network:

That's one of the more absurd criticisms I've heard yet -- do you also expect a Freightliner with a 53 foot trailer to be able to fuel up at your local corner store gas station that only sells gasoline?  Of course not.

[LennStar]

It's not nearly that easy. Multi-lane highways generally aren't next to the existing train stations, so in addition to the infrastructure of the track, you'd need to build all the stations, plus the roads and parking to reach those stations.

MEEEEPP! US confusion! You don't need parking spaces at a train station! Well, a hand full for Taxis and a bus loop. But that is way less than your average clover leaf.

Not to mention: If the US is known for one thing, than for the amount of space. Just look what all the single family houses are using! The vast stroads! Space galore!

I mean, if it is for a new highway (lane), the "space" problem is the same, just worse, and those are still build, so it's not like it's physically or legally impossible.
Worst case, build the trains above the highways. Or under. Works in other places, so why not in the US? (btw. In Tokyo train lines are build above rivers (well, canals)).

at your local corner store gas station that only sells gasoline?

Such a thing exists?
I know a hand full of stations here in Germany that only sell diesel, but those are afaik generally not open for the public but only companies, or it's a sort of agri collective.

But a fuel station without diesel? Never seen one.

[Raenia]

It's not nearly that easy. Multi-lane highways generally aren't next to the existing train stations, so in addition to the infrastructure of the track, you'd need to build all the stations, plus the roads and parking to reach those stations. Even if you just want to make the station an exit off the highway, that's still a lot of expensive infrastructure and additional space, beyond just trading a lane of highway into a rail.

I've long thought that the interstate media would be the perfect place for passenger train rails. Then visited Chicago and lo and behold they did that with their commuter trains.

My imagined version has the trains running in the media with under passes to stations located in towns along the route.

We'd love to have a train to ride from here to the big metro where we attend concerts and other entertainment. Attend the concert and ride home to our town sleepy or tipsy with no problems. Right now I drive DW/teen/friends to the concerts and then park somewhere nearby. Grab a coffee and/or sandwich (use their wifi) and nap. Saves a little on parking, and I'm 100% good to drive while they gleefully recount how great the concert was and fall asleep.

I assume you mean median, but if you meant something else let me know and I'll adjust my response.

Not all interstates have medians, particularly when going through cities. 95 runs from NY to FL, and runs directly through the centers of Philly, Baltimore, Wilmington, etc. Going through those cities, the highway is frequently elevated above the city, with the regular city streets passing below it. If you're really lucky, the Amtrack line runs parallel or beneath the highway, but mostly it doesn't. (I can't tell if the street view photo I tried to attached worked or not, but this is the view from a city street. That overpass IS the interstate. Where would you like the train to run?)

I'm sure it could work in younger cities, where the city was built around the highway, or in better designed cities where the highway passes beside the city with a beltway or other access road, but the east coast isn't either of those things.

It's not nearly that easy. Multi-lane highways generally aren't next to the existing train stations, so in addition to the infrastructure of the track, you'd need to build all the stations, plus the roads and parking to reach those stations.

MEEEEPP! US confusion! You don't need parking spaces at a train station! Well, a hand full for Taxis and a bus loop. But that is way less than your average clover leaf.

Not to mention: If the US is known for one thing, than for the amount of space. Just look what all the single family houses are using! The vast stroads! Space galore!

I mean, if it is for a new highway (lane), the "space" problem is the same, just worse, and those are still build, so it's not like it's physically or legally impossible.
Worst case, build the trains above the highways. Or under. Works in other places, so why not in the US? (btw. In Tokyo train lines are build above rivers (well, canals)).

Yeah, that's not going to work in the US, where bus travel is universally reviled, whether it's actually terrible or not. Convincing people to haul their suitcases on a bus, in order to transfer to a train, is definitely not going to happen. Not having any parking at the station is a great way to guarantee no one uses your train.

The US may have a lot of space, but someone owns that space. There's a huge amount of pushback against the government using eminent domain to seize land for projects like this, and even when they do, it's hideously expensive, because they're required to compensate the owner for the appropriate value. And it actually is very difficult to add new lanes to existing highways, if the government doesn't already own the land on either side. The difference is, you can add the new lane for just a few miles where the land is available. A train line that runs only a few miles won't be much use to anyone.

I'm not saying it's physically impossible, just that it's politically and culturally impossible.

Like I said before, I would personally love it if trains gained traction - we regularly walk to the local train station, and the last few times we've flown we've taken the train to the airport (and that's been a few years now). In fact, I'm going to be walking to the train this afternoon to get into the city. But public transit here regularly takes twice as long as driving, is less comfortable, and requires a lot of waiting around in dirty, uncomfortable spaces. I'm six months pregnant and will likely be stuck sitting - or even standing - in an un-conditioned space for over an hour in 85F heat, waiting for connections. You can't really be surprised when people decide not to go with that option.

[Paper Chaser]

Is all this just over the use of the term "long haul"?  New tech enables new options that may or may not fit into existing classifications, would it make you happy to call the Tesla truck a "longer than short haul" - something else?

Yeah, it more or less comes down to a misunderstanding of what "long haul" truly is, or what jobs batteries are and are not good at.  Lots of people assume incorrectly that all semis are the same, so the Tesla Semi can surely do long haul stuff, and we can then simply extrapolate that we can solve a lot of these issues with more/bigger batteries. We see similar thinking with buses. School buses and city buses are strong candidates for electrification because they do lots of stop and go driving at relatively low speeds, in defined routes. A Greyhound bus or motorcoach is also a bus, but they spend their days traveling long distances at higher speeds on less defined routes. These are not good candidates for batteries.

The fact is that duty cycles matter. Batteries can be great at doing light duty work, or even heavy duty work for short periods of time. They're not a realistic option for lots of tasks that involve hard work for long periods of time, or with limited down time, or lack of access to charging. This is why a Ford Lightning F150 is a terrific Suburban Cowboy commuter or local contractor rig, and a terrible tow vehicle. It's why a Model 3 Performance can be a great drivers car, but can't complete a bunch of fast laps on a race track. Or why a battery powered chainsaw/lawn mower/etc might work great for a homeowner, but can't run all day like a gas one used by professionals.

The Tesla Semi is a day cab. These types of trucks are intended to start and finish their days on the same routes over and over. They have no sleeping accommodations for drivers, they don't typically travel more than a couple hundred miles from a central base. EV trucks can currently do this work reasonably well, and it's an important part of trucking. But it doesn't mean that we're on our way to having all of the semis that you see on interstates running on electrons.

The Tesla Semi in particular has opted for larger batteries than other EV semis. This gives them the ability to travel further, but most day cab trucks aren't used in that manner. They don't drive 500 miles one-way and then stop. They start and finish their days from the same location. Musk himself claimed at one point that 80% of freight in the US is moved less than 250 miles, which is more or less what the gov says:
https://data.bts.gov/stories/s/Moving-Goods-in-the-United-States/bcyt-rqmu/

So a fleet buyer might look at the extra cost for the 1000kwh battery and decide to go another route instead. Or they might be a weight sensitive application, where the additional weight of that huge battery reduces the freight efficiency. If we're worried about climate change, why are we putting 1000kwh batteries into trucks to service a very small portion of the trucking demand? Split that battery into 2 500kwh packs and double the impact. It would reduce the price, improve the freight efficiency, and increase adoption/environmental benefit. Leave the long haul or heavy work stuff for other cleaner tech.

[Paper Chaser]

Regarding Tesla Semis: Most people are familiar with Teslas “superchargers”, their L3 charging network which is by far the most built out in NA.

For their commercial heavy trucks Tesla is adding “mega chargers” which can put out 750 kW of DC current or 3x more than the v3 superchargers.

Yep. Way more power needed, which means way higher cost to install. And they seem to use a different connector than the NACS that Tesla prefers, so the Semi may not even be able to utilize the regular Supercharger network:

That's one of the more absurd criticisms I've heard yet -- do you also expect a Freightliner with a 53 foot trailer to be able to fuel up at your local corner store gas station that only sells gasoline?  Of course not.

I brought it up because many of the same people that think all semis are the same probably also assume that all EV chargers or even all Tesla chargers are the same.

Paying for super expensive Megachargers is also going to negatively impact the appeal of a Tesla semi to many fleets that don't have them fully paid for by tax payers. That's a hurdle for adoption.

Your example of a semi needing it's own infrastructure actually illustrates my larger point quite well. We've had multiple fuels for different needs for over a century. There's a legitimate reason why semis and heavy equipment use diesel fuel instead of gasoline. This thinking that batteries will be able to solve all of our problems and handle any duty cycle seems flawed to me. Batteries are great at certain things and applications, but for a lot of heavy, continuous work (the stuff that diesel has historically done) we're probably going to have to find another alternative.

I think you might've been the poster who recently shared the link to the electric heavy duty mining truck that never needs charging because it can regen and gain all of the energy back. I see the Tesla semi's 500 mile trip in a similar light right now. It's great for a very unique situation, but we should be careful in making any further assumptions. For most other regional/day cab uses it's probably expensive overkill that could be better served and more impactful with a battery that's half the size.

[GuitarStv]

Public transit is not on the table right now because we still haven't collectively accepted the crisis that we're in.  Until we do, it's going to be extremely hard to get people to accept the need for actual lifestyle change and that magical technology on it's own certainly isn't going to save us from the coming apocalypse.

[JLee]

It's not nearly that easy. Multi-lane highways generally aren't next to the existing train stations, so in addition to the infrastructure of the track, you'd need to build all the stations, plus the roads and parking to reach those stations.

MEEEEPP! US confusion! You don't need parking spaces at a train station! Well, a hand full for Taxis and a bus loop. But that is way less than your average clover leaf.

Not to mention: If the US is known for one thing, than for the amount of space. Just look what all the single family houses are using! The vast stroads! Space galore!

I mean, if it is for a new highway (lane), the "space" problem is the same, just worse, and those are still build, so it's not like it's physically or legally impossible.
Worst case, build the trains above the highways. Or under. Works in other places, so why not in the US? (btw. In Tokyo train lines are build above rivers (well, canals)).

at your local corner store gas station that only sells gasoline?

Such a thing exists?
I know a hand full of stations here in Germany that only sell diesel, but those are afaik generally not open for the public but only companies, or it's a sort of agri collective.

But a fuel station without diesel? Never seen one.

Many gas stations in the US offer three grades of gasoline, no diesel - e.g. this one near my town:

[Just Joe]

It's not nearly that easy. Multi-lane highways generally aren't next to the existing train stations, so in addition to the infrastructure of the track, you'd need to build all the stations, plus the roads and parking to reach those stations.

MEEEEPP! US confusion! You don't need parking spaces at a train station! Well, a hand full for Taxis and a bus loop. But that is way less than your average clover leaf.

Not to mention: If the US is known for one thing, than for the amount of space. Just look what all the single family houses are using! The vast stroads! Space galore!

I mean, if it is for a new highway (lane), the "space" problem is the same, just worse, and those are still build, so it's not like it's physically or legally impossible.
Worst case, build the trains above the highways. Or under. Works in other places, so why not in the US? (btw. In Tokyo train lines are build above rivers (well, canals)).

at your local corner store gas station that only sells gasoline?

Such a thing exists?
I know a hand full of stations here in Germany that only sell diesel, but those are afaik generally not open for the public but only companies, or it's a sort of agri collective.

But a fuel station without diesel? Never seen one.

Its easy to find gas stations here in my part of the USA that don't sell diesel. Almost no cars burn diesel here. Some of the largest pickup trucks do. Only a small portion of the white van commercial vehicles do.

The agri-collection you mention would be called a farmer's co-op (cooperative). The ones in my area also sell diesel which is untaxed for tractors and other farm machinery. It is very bad to put this diesel in a pickup truck and drive that pickup truck on the road. I'm told they can stop a truck and check to see if they are running gas station diesel or co-op diesel (somehow, dye?). Perhaps that dye would stain the fuel filter. A person could be heavily fined for doing the wrong thing.

[Just Joe]

I assume you mean median, but if you meant something else let me know and I'll adjust my response.

Not all interstates have medians, particularly when going through cities. 95 runs from NY to FL, and runs directly through the centers of Philly, Baltimore, Wilmington, etc. Going through those cities, the highway is frequently elevated above the city, with the regular city streets passing below it. If you're really lucky, the Amtrack line runs parallel or beneath the highway, but mostly it doesn't. (I can't tell if the street view photo I tried to attached worked or not, but this is the view from a city street. That overpass IS the interstate. Where would you like the train to run?)

Good point. I don't live in the crowded NE. Here in my part of the middle, all the interstates have an unused median until you reach the metro areas. Use the available space, whatever makes sense for a place.

Brightline is doing great things in FL I hear. Nice trains, expanding network. I assume that b/c they are a young company they don't face the same legacy costs that a competitor like Amtrack probably supports.

Lennstar - any trains here would require a parking lot b/c there would be no way for a portion of the riders to reach the train station without a car. Still, would be nice to drive the few miles home after doing the majority of the trip by train. I could bike the trip to our town's likely train station (where the antique depot is) but that would me 8 miles on very dark country roads for the ride home.

[JLee]

It's not nearly that easy. Multi-lane highways generally aren't next to the existing train stations, so in addition to the infrastructure of the track, you'd need to build all the stations, plus the roads and parking to reach those stations.

MEEEEPP! US confusion! You don't need parking spaces at a train station! Well, a hand full for Taxis and a bus loop. But that is way less than your average clover leaf.

Not to mention: If the US is known for one thing, than for the amount of space. Just look what all the single family houses are using! The vast stroads! Space galore!

I mean, if it is for a new highway (lane), the "space" problem is the same, just worse, and those are still build, so it's not like it's physically or legally impossible.
Worst case, build the trains above the highways. Or under. Works in other places, so why not in the US? (btw. In Tokyo train lines are build above rivers (well, canals)).

at your local corner store gas station that only sells gasoline?

Such a thing exists?
I know a hand full of stations here in Germany that only sell diesel, but those are afaik generally not open for the public but only companies, or it's a sort of agri collective.

But a fuel station without diesel? Never seen one.

Its easy to find gas stations here in my part of the USA that don't sell diesel. Almost no cars burn diesel here. Some of the largest pickup trucks do. Only a small portion of the white van commercial vehicles do.

The agri-collection you mention would be called a farmer's co-op (cooperative). The ones in my area also sell diesel which is untaxed for tractors and other farm machinery. It is very bad to put this diesel in a pickup truck and drive that pickup truck on the road. I'm told they can stop a truck and check to see if they are running gas station diesel or co-op diesel (somehow, dye?). Perhaps that dye would stain the fuel filter. A person could be heavily fined for doing the wrong thing.

Yep the agricultural diesel typically has red dye in it.  Huge huge huge fines if you're caught using it on road.

[GuitarStv]

It's not nearly that easy. Multi-lane highways generally aren't next to the existing train stations, so in addition to the infrastructure of the track, you'd need to build all the stations, plus the roads and parking to reach those stations.

MEEEEPP! US confusion! You don't need parking spaces at a train station! Well, a hand full for Taxis and a bus loop. But that is way less than your average clover leaf.

Not to mention: If the US is known for one thing, than for the amount of space. Just look what all the single family houses are using! The vast stroads! Space galore!

I mean, if it is for a new highway (lane), the "space" problem is the same, just worse, and those are still build, so it's not like it's physically or legally impossible.
Worst case, build the trains above the highways. Or under. Works in other places, so why not in the US? (btw. In Tokyo train lines are build above rivers (well, canals)).

at your local corner store gas station that only sells gasoline?

Such a thing exists?
I know a hand full of stations here in Germany that only sell diesel, but those are afaik generally not open for the public but only companies, or it's a sort of agri collective.

But a fuel station without diesel? Never seen one.

Its easy to find gas stations here in my part of the USA that don't sell diesel. Almost no cars burn diesel here. Some of the largest pickup trucks do. Only a small portion of the white van commercial vehicles do.

The agri-collection you mention would be called a farmer's co-op (cooperative). The ones in my area also sell diesel which is untaxed for tractors and other farm machinery. It is very bad to put this diesel in a pickup truck and drive that pickup truck on the road. I'm told they can stop a truck and check to see if they are running gas station diesel or co-op diesel (somehow, dye?). Perhaps that dye would stain the fuel filter. A person could be heavily fined for doing the wrong thing.

Yep the agricultural diesel typically has red dye in it.  Huge huge huge fines if you're caught using it on road.

Not encouraging it, but it's pretty rare for police to dip your tanks from a traffic stop.  Very occasionally for trucks, but I bet if you ran a small diesel car on farm gas you would never have it checked.

[Paper Chaser]

Farm diesel used to have higher sulfur content, but these days it's just road diesel with red dye in it. The only reason you'd get in trouble for using it in road vehicles is because it's often taxed less or not at all. Skipping out on taxes is obviously something that governments tend to take pretty seriously, but there should be no difference in performance or emissions when using farm diesel in road vehicles or using road diesel in farm vehicles.

[pecunia]

Farm diesel used to have higher sulfur content, but these days it's just road diesel with red dye in it. The only reason you'd get in trouble for using it in road vehicles is because it's often taxed less or not at all. Skipping out on taxes is obviously something that governments tend to take pretty seriously, but there should be no difference in performance or emissions when using farm diesel in road vehicles or using road diesel in farm vehicles.

How about fuel oil? (heating oil)  Isn't that taxed at a lower level?  Is it dyed?

[Paper Chaser]

Farm diesel used to have higher sulfur content, but these days it's just road diesel with red dye in it. The only reason you'd get in trouble for using it in road vehicles is because it's often taxed less or not at all. Skipping out on taxes is obviously something that governments tend to take pretty seriously, but there should be no difference in performance or emissions when using farm diesel in road vehicles or using road diesel in farm vehicles.

How about fuel oil? (heating oil)  Isn't that taxed at a lower level?  Is it dyed?

Fuel oil has different composition from diesel, so you'll have different emissions. As for what is possible, an old mechanical diesel would run it just fine but a modern, electronically controlled diesel wouldn't be happy, and you'd probably trash the expensive aftertreatment system fairly quickly.

[Tyson]

Is all this just over the use of the term "long haul"?  New tech enables new options that may or may not fit into existing classifications, would it make you happy to call the Tesla truck a "longer than short haul" - something else?

Yeah, it more or less comes down to a misunderstanding of what "long haul" truly is, or what jobs batteries are and are not good at.  Lots of people assume incorrectly that all semis are the same, so the Tesla Semi can surely do long haul stuff, and we can then simply extrapolate that we can solve a lot of these issues with more/bigger batteries. We see similar thinking with buses. School buses and city buses are strong candidates for electrification because they do lots of stop and go driving at relatively low speeds, in defined routes. A Greyhound bus or motorcoach is also a bus, but they spend their days traveling long distances at higher speeds on less defined routes. These are not good candidates for batteries.

The fact is that duty cycles matter. Batteries can be great at doing light duty work, or even heavy duty work for short periods of time. They're not a realistic option for lots of tasks that involve hard work for long periods of time, or with limited down time, or lack of access to charging. This is why a Ford Lightning F150 is a terrific Suburban Cowboy commuter or local contractor rig, and a terrible tow vehicle. It's why a Model 3 Performance can be a great drivers car, but can't complete a bunch of fast laps on a race track. Or why a battery powered chainsaw/lawn mower/etc might work great for a homeowner, but can't run all day like a gas one used by professionals.

The Tesla Semi is a day cab. These types of trucks are intended to start and finish their days on the same routes over and over. They have no sleeping accommodations for drivers, they don't typically travel more than a couple hundred miles from a central base. EV trucks can currently do this work reasonably well, and it's an important part of trucking. But it doesn't mean that we're on our way to having all of the semis that you see on interstates running on electrons.

The Tesla Semi in particular has opted for larger batteries than other EV semis. This gives them the ability to travel further, but most day cab trucks aren't used in that manner. They don't drive 500 miles one-way and then stop. They start and finish their days from the same location. Musk himself claimed at one point that 80% of freight in the US is moved less than 250 miles, which is more or less what the gov says:
https://data.bts.gov/stories/s/Moving-Goods-in-the-United-States/bcyt-rqmu/

So a fleet buyer might look at the extra cost for the 1000kwh battery and decide to go another route instead. Or they might be a weight sensitive application, where the additional weight of that huge battery reduces the freight efficiency. If we're worried about climate change, why are we putting 1000kwh batteries into trucks to service a very small portion of the trucking demand? Split that battery into 2 500kwh packs and double the impact. It would reduce the price, improve the freight efficiency, and increase adoption/environmental benefit. Leave the long haul or heavy work stuff for other cleaner tech.

There are several other companies out there doing mid-range (and short range) electric trucks.  So it's been possible for a while now, to buy a truck that can do mid-range routes.  The long term criticism of BEV's was that 'they can't do long haul work'.  Well, the Tesla Semi is the answer to that.  Yes, now they can. 

[Paper Chaser]

Is all this just over the use of the term "long haul"?  New tech enables new options that may or may not fit into existing classifications, would it make you happy to call the Tesla truck a "longer than short haul" - something else?

Yeah, it more or less comes down to a misunderstanding of what "long haul" truly is, or what jobs batteries are and are not good at.  Lots of people assume incorrectly that all semis are the same, so the Tesla Semi can surely do long haul stuff, and we can then simply extrapolate that we can solve a lot of these issues with more/bigger batteries. We see similar thinking with buses. School buses and city buses are strong candidates for electrification because they do lots of stop and go driving at relatively low speeds, in defined routes. A Greyhound bus or motorcoach is also a bus, but they spend their days traveling long distances at higher speeds on less defined routes. These are not good candidates for batteries.

The fact is that duty cycles matter. Batteries can be great at doing light duty work, or even heavy duty work for short periods of time. They're not a realistic option for lots of tasks that involve hard work for long periods of time, or with limited down time, or lack of access to charging. This is why a Ford Lightning F150 is a terrific Suburban Cowboy commuter or local contractor rig, and a terrible tow vehicle. It's why a Model 3 Performance can be a great drivers car, but can't complete a bunch of fast laps on a race track. Or why a battery powered chainsaw/lawn mower/etc might work great for a homeowner, but can't run all day like a gas one used by professionals.

The Tesla Semi is a day cab. These types of trucks are intended to start and finish their days on the same routes over and over. They have no sleeping accommodations for drivers, they don't typically travel more than a couple hundred miles from a central base. EV trucks can currently do this work reasonably well, and it's an important part of trucking. But it doesn't mean that we're on our way to having all of the semis that you see on interstates running on electrons.

The Tesla Semi in particular has opted for larger batteries than other EV semis. This gives them the ability to travel further, but most day cab trucks aren't used in that manner. They don't drive 500 miles one-way and then stop. They start and finish their days from the same location. Musk himself claimed at one point that 80% of freight in the US is moved less than 250 miles, which is more or less what the gov says:
https://data.bts.gov/stories/s/Moving-Goods-in-the-United-States/bcyt-rqmu/

So a fleet buyer might look at the extra cost for the 1000kwh battery and decide to go another route instead. Or they might be a weight sensitive application, where the additional weight of that huge battery reduces the freight efficiency. If we're worried about climate change, why are we putting 1000kwh batteries into trucks to service a very small portion of the trucking demand? Split that battery into 2 500kwh packs and double the impact. It would reduce the price, improve the freight efficiency, and increase adoption/environmental benefit. Leave the long haul or heavy work stuff for other cleaner tech.

There are several other companies out there doing mid-range (and short range) electric trucks.  So it's been possible for a while now, to buy a truck that can do mid-range routes.  The long term criticism of BEV's was that 'they can't do long haul work'.  Well, the Tesla Semi is the answer to that.  Yes, now they can.

And what I'm saying is that a single 500 mile route in a day cab doesn't really qualify as "long haul". It has no sleeper. There are essentially no chargers to support it. And 500 miles isn't quite a full shift's worth of driving (600-650 miles per shift is fairly common with current ICE trucks). Elon says that the 500 mile trip took 8 hours. A driver's shift is typically 11 hours. That's a 3 hours per day that the Tesla driver isn't moving down the road, which is a pretty big deal in an industry where truck buying decisions are made based on 1% fuel economy differences.

The Tesla Semi is capable of making a very specific 500 mile trip between super expensive, taxpayer funded chargers. Other than that, it's limited to being a short haul truck like all other day cabs, and all other EV semis. The majority of it's use involves starting and finishing it's day at the same location, charging overnight and doing it again the next day. That's not what "long haul" trucking is, and it's probably not currently cost comparative to the status quo.

There's nothing at all wrong with EV semis for short haul work if the financial math or regulations support that. And I don't think there's anything wrong with saying that they don't currently work for long haul duty cycles or usage.

If Tesla were truly going for long haul, "Over the road" trucking the truck would need a sleeper (adding weight and cost to the cab), and it would need closer to 700 miles of range (adding weight and cost to the cab). Both of those choices would obviously hurt the freight efficiency and mean that less freight would be hauled per truckload too. I'm ignoring the lack of charging infrastructure for the sake of simplicity.

So what we have is a truck that can't do actual long haul work (open ended, all day interstate driving to random locations), but one that's probably got far more capability than needed for the vast majority of short haul work. Unless the Tesla is priced similar to other EV semis (giving the buyer more capability for less money), no fleet buyer is going to overpay for capability they don't need. The entire industry is about optimization, and paying for 500 miles of battery capacity when you only really need 200-300 is not optimized. There was supposed to be a shorter range Tesla Semi at some point, but I haven't seen/heard anything about it in a long time. That's the one that would really be enticing for many fleet buyers because the smaller battery would reduce weight and cost, and would likely be better optimized for their usage than a truck that can do more than short haul, but less than long haul.

[Tyson]

Is all this just over the use of the term "long haul"?  New tech enables new options that may or may not fit into existing classifications, would it make you happy to call the Tesla truck a "longer than short haul" - something else?

Yeah, it more or less comes down to a misunderstanding of what "long haul" truly is, or what jobs batteries are and are not good at.  Lots of people assume incorrectly that all semis are the same, so the Tesla Semi can surely do long haul stuff, and we can then simply extrapolate that we can solve a lot of these issues with more/bigger batteries. We see similar thinking with buses. School buses and city buses are strong candidates for electrification because they do lots of stop and go driving at relatively low speeds, in defined routes. A Greyhound bus or motorcoach is also a bus, but they spend their days traveling long distances at higher speeds on less defined routes. These are not good candidates for batteries.

The fact is that duty cycles matter. Batteries can be great at doing light duty work, or even heavy duty work for short periods of time. They're not a realistic option for lots of tasks that involve hard work for long periods of time, or with limited down time, or lack of access to charging. This is why a Ford Lightning F150 is a terrific Suburban Cowboy commuter or local contractor rig, and a terrible tow vehicle. It's why a Model 3 Performance can be a great drivers car, but can't complete a bunch of fast laps on a race track. Or why a battery powered chainsaw/lawn mower/etc might work great for a homeowner, but can't run all day like a gas one used by professionals.

The Tesla Semi is a day cab. These types of trucks are intended to start and finish their days on the same routes over and over. They have no sleeping accommodations for drivers, they don't typically travel more than a couple hundred miles from a central base. EV trucks can currently do this work reasonably well, and it's an important part of trucking. But it doesn't mean that we're on our way to having all of the semis that you see on interstates running on electrons.

The Tesla Semi in particular has opted for larger batteries than other EV semis. This gives them the ability to travel further, but most day cab trucks aren't used in that manner. They don't drive 500 miles one-way and then stop. They start and finish their days from the same location. Musk himself claimed at one point that 80% of freight in the US is moved less than 250 miles, which is more or less what the gov says:
https://data.bts.gov/stories/s/Moving-Goods-in-the-United-States/bcyt-rqmu/

So a fleet buyer might look at the extra cost for the 1000kwh battery and decide to go another route instead. Or they might be a weight sensitive application, where the additional weight of that huge battery reduces the freight efficiency. If we're worried about climate change, why are we putting 1000kwh batteries into trucks to service a very small portion of the trucking demand? Split that battery into 2 500kwh packs and double the impact. It would reduce the price, improve the freight efficiency, and increase adoption/environmental benefit. Leave the long haul or heavy work stuff for other cleaner tech.

There are several other companies out there doing mid-range (and short range) electric trucks.  So it's been possible for a while now, to buy a truck that can do mid-range routes.  The long term criticism of BEV's was that 'they can't do long haul work'.  Well, the Tesla Semi is the answer to that.  Yes, now they can.

And what I'm saying is that a single 500 mile route in a day cab doesn't really qualify as "long haul". It has no sleeper. There are essentially no chargers to support it. And 500 miles isn't quite a full shift's worth of driving (600-650 miles per shift is fairly common with current ICE trucks). Elon says that the 500 mile trip took 8 hours. A driver's shift is typically 11 hours. That's a 3 hours per day that the Tesla driver isn't moving down the road, which is a pretty big deal in an industry where truck buying decisions are made based on 1% fuel economy differences.

The Tesla Semi is capable of making a very specific 500 mile trip between super expensive, taxpayer funded chargers. Other than that, it's limited to being a short haul truck like all other day cabs, and all other EV semis. The majority of it's use involves starting and finishing it's day at the same location, charging overnight and doing it again the next day. That's not what "long haul" trucking is, and it's probably not currently cost comparative to the status quo.

There's nothing at all wrong with EV semis for short haul work if the financial math or regulations support that. And I don't think there's anything wrong with saying that they don't currently work for long haul duty cycles or usage.

If Tesla were truly going for long haul, "Over the road" trucking the truck would need a sleeper (adding weight and cost to the cab), and it would need closer to 700 miles of range (adding weight and cost to the cab). Both of those choices would obviously hurt the freight efficiency and mean that less freight would be hauled per truckload too. I'm ignoring the lack of charging infrastructure for the sake of simplicity.

So what we have is a truck that can't do actual long haul work (open ended, all day interstate driving to random locations), but one that's probably got far more capability than needed for the vast majority of short haul work. Unless the Tesla is priced similar to other EV semis (giving the buyer more capability for less money), no fleet buyer is going to overpay for capability they don't need. The entire industry is about optimization, and paying for 500 miles of battery capacity when you only really need 200-300 is not optimized. There was supposed to be a shorter range Tesla Semi at some point, but I haven't seen/heard anything about it in a long time. That's the one that would really be enticing for many fleet buyers because the smaller battery would reduce weight and cost, and would likely be better optimized for their usage than a truck that can do more than short haul, but less than long haul.

These are very similar objections that people raised about EV's in general - too expensive, take too long to charge, don't go far enough on a charge, etc....

I'm not saying your points are not valid.  In fact I agree with many of them.  But I also think they are backward looking and not forward looking. 

The biggest issue I see going forward is the charging infrastructure needs to be built out.  If that is accomplished then the rest of the points fade away, IMO. 

Luckily, Tesla seems to be pretty good at building out chargers, and for much cheaper than the rest of the industry.  Hell, look at what they built out (from scratch) for regular BEV's already:



You can see they already have a major presence along the major highways.  For trucking it'd just need to be along these same areas, but larger.  And probably fewer of them.

[bacchi]

You can see they already have a major presence along the major highways.  For trucking it'd just need to be along these same areas, but larger.  And probably fewer of them.

Way larger. A megacharger is, what, 1.6 MW at 480v? Enough megachargers at, say, Love's Truck Stop would mean a substation. Who's going to pay for that construction?

[Paper Chaser]

You can see they already have a major presence along the major highways.  For trucking it'd just need to be along these same areas, but larger.  And probably fewer of them.

Way larger. A megacharger is, what, 1.6 MW at 480v? Enough megachargers at, say, Love's Truck Stop would mean a substation. Who's going to pay for that construction?

Yeah, I haven't looked for any data or done any math so perhaps I'm wrong but I'm a bit skeptical of the idea that there wouldn't need to be as many Megachargers too. Right now most EVs are owned by civilians that can charge where they park, so Superchargers/DC fast chargers are primarily used for the small percentage of driving that is long trips. Long Haul semis aren't going to be that way. They live on the road, so all of them will need to charge once per day wherever they end up near the end of their shift. In my early morning commute, truck stops are jammed with 50+ trucks and most of the on/off ramp interchanges have 1-2 dozen trucks just parked on the side of the road as overflow for the truck stops. That won't be an option for an EV truck, and those trucks will need to go charge somewhere.

[Just Joe]

Not encouraging it, but it's pretty rare for police to dip your tanks from a traffic stop.  Very occasionally for trucks, but I bet if you ran a small diesel car on farm gas you would never have it checked.

I knew someone in Italy that ran his car on ag diesel 100% of the time back in the early 90s. Pretty neat idea I thought as a non-farm kid with no understanding of the rules or the risks. He was never caught.

The difference in cost there was huge. The difference in cost here probably wouldn't be worth the risk of being caught in a small car. In a thirsty pickup, might be different math.

[nereo]

Not encouraging it, but it's pretty rare for police to dip your tanks from a traffic stop.  Very occasionally for trucks, but I bet if you ran a small diesel car on farm gas you would never have it checked.

I knew someone in Italy that ran his car on ag diesel 100% of the time back in the early 90s. Pretty neat idea I thought as a non-farm kid with no understanding of the rules or the risks. He was never caught.

The difference in cost there was huge. The difference in cost here probably wouldn't be worth the risk of being caught in a small car. In a thirsty pickup, might be different math.

Around here LEOs are known to keep an eye on the petrol-stations and will ticket drivers that are blatantly filling their vehicles with agricultural (non-taxed) fuel. Occasionally you'll hear about state inspection checkpoints that will also dip the tanks for diesel cars as you pass through.   And as you cross back and forth over the US/CAN boarder agents can do whatever inspections they want.

Even if you are morally ok with breaking the laws, the cost-benefit of saving a couple hundred bucks per year vs the fines and potential impoundment of your vehicle make it very unworth the risk IMO.

[GuitarStv]

Not encouraging it, but it's pretty rare for police to dip your tanks from a traffic stop.  Very occasionally for trucks, but I bet if you ran a small diesel car on farm gas you would never have it checked.

I knew someone in Italy that ran his car on ag diesel 100% of the time back in the early 90s. Pretty neat idea I thought as a non-farm kid with no understanding of the rules or the risks. He was never caught.

The difference in cost there was huge. The difference in cost here probably wouldn't be worth the risk of being caught in a small car. In a thirsty pickup, might be different math.

Around here LEOs are known to keep an eye on the petrol-stations and will ticket drivers that are blatantly filling their vehicles with agricultural (non-taxed) fuel. Occasionally you'll hear about state inspection checkpoints that will also dip the tanks for diesel cars as you pass through.   And as you cross back and forth over the US/CAN boarder agents can do whatever inspections they want.

Even if you are morally ok with breaking the laws, the cost-benefit of saving a couple hundred bucks per year vs the fines and potential impoundment of your vehicle make it very unworth the risk IMO.

You would have to be pretty stupid to get caught filling your car at the station though.  Just throw the gas in a few jerry cans with your farm equipment and then fill it back at home.

[GilesMM]

Not encouraging it, but it's pretty rare for police to dip your tanks from a traffic stop.  Very occasionally for trucks, but I bet if you ran a small diesel car on farm gas you would never have it checked.

I knew someone in Italy that ran his car on ag diesel 100% of the time back in the early 90s. Pretty neat idea I thought as a non-farm kid with no understanding of the rules or the risks. He was never caught.

The difference in cost there was huge. The difference in cost here probably wouldn't be worth the risk of being caught in a small car. In a thirsty pickup, might be different math.

Some US states do random checks for red diesel in road vehicles.  Fines vary by state but start at $1,000 and ramp up fast for additional offenses.