For the past few days, NACFE has been studying the mileage, range, energy consumption and charging times of Tesla Semi’s running in PepsiCo’s fleet. This is an interesting insight into the operation of these cars from the point of view of companies that know how their trucks are operated. It appears that the Semi is able to cover between 500 and 600 kilometers / 310 and 370 miles on a single charge for long stretches on highways. The range increases to 800+ kilometers / 500+ miles when urban-suburban areas increase.
Tesla Semi in real-world applications
The experiment involves three tractor-trailers named Tesla 1/2/3, and all the results can be viewed on the RunOnLess website (HERE). The tractors cover various distances in a day, from 300 to almost 1,400 kilometers / from 190 to 870 miles, with 600-1,200 kilometers / 370-750 miles as a rule. Road/highway speeds (80+ km/h / 50+ mph) are used, again as a rule, for 90 and more percent of the routes, which fits the pattern of “we start from the logistics center and reach the recipient in some village.” This is especially true of Tesla 1 and Tesla 3 semis, we believe, with larger batteries.
If the vehicles don’t have the ability to recharge, and have to get somewhere far away, the battery is close to being discharged after just over 7 hours of operation. Charging to 80 percent takes 50-60 minutes, topping up another 15-20 percent of the battery forces a stop that lasts a second time. It appears that drivers are actively using the navigation hint to tell them to replenish the battery to reach their destination safely. At the location marked by the first arrow, enough was recharged to keep the car dangerously close to 0 percent at the destination location (second arrow):
Charging took the cars 8-20 percent of the time during the day, the cars were waiting for something or were unused for at least the second amount. It can be deduced from this that even if the tractors charged more slowly, they would still fit in the time they stood unused.
The longest range of the Semi on a single charge that we noticed was about 620 kilometers / 385 miles, although there was also a Semi driving around more cities (?), as it used speeds of 80+ km/h / 50+ mph for “just” 81 percent of the distance. This Semi needed 28 percent of the battery to cover 255 kilometers / 158 miles. We can easily calculate that 90 percent of the battery (95 -> 5 percent) should be enough for it to cover almost 820 kilometers:
To date (11 days), all three tractors have covered 408,007 kilometers / 253 954 miles. The entire experiment is expected to last 18 days. It has not been disclosed what loads the tractors are driving with, but since they are visiting different locations and spending some time there, they are probably loads that are “typical” for PepsiCo plants, i.e. snacks plus beverages. The weather is favorable for the vehicles, with temperatures of dozen degrees Celsius / ~50-60 degrees Fahrenheit.
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