Musk presents Tesla’s first battery-powered heavy-duty truck

Monday, 12 December 2022 00:42 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Electric vehicles giant Tesla delivered recently its first heavy-duty, battery-powered truck, Semi, some three years later than initially promised.

Tesla chief Elon Musk presented the vehicle at an event in Nevada.

“That thing looks like it came from the future,” Tesla chief Elon Musk said.

The vehicle has been highly anticipated since Musk first unveiled its prototype in 2017, promising the vehicle would start rolling out in 2019. The delay is believed to be due to battery constraints.

According to Musk, the Semi-truck has a range per charge of 500 miles (around 800 kilometres) when pulling an 82,000-pound (37,000-kilo) load. Its weight limit allows it to transport over 33,000 pounds (14,969 kilograms) of cargo. The Tesla chief has claimed that the truck’s power is three times that of a diesel-powered truck. He described it as a “game changer.”

During the lag between Semi’s announcing and unveiling, several vehicle competitors rolled out their own trucks, including Daimler, Volvo and China’s BYD.