Mercedes Introduces Electric Semi-Truck to Compete with Tesla
Mercedes-Benz Trucks has unveiled an electric truck designed to compete with Tesla Inc.’s Semi, as part of the ongoing competition to reduce carbon emissions in the transportation industry.
A unit of Daimler Truck Holding AG said on Tuesday that the eActros 600, which can travel 500 kilometers on a single charge and carry up to 22 tonnes of cargo, will go on sale at the end of this year. It aims to take on Tesla’s truck, which has already received orders from Walmart Inc. and United Parcel Service Inc.
The vehicle’s battery can be charged from 20% to 80%, which is the threshold considered the best for maintaining battery life, in 30 minutes if the customer has a one-megawatt charger, according to the company, the equivalent amount of electricity needed to charge about 1,000 batteries. homes.
The electrification of heavy commercial vehicles is one of the biggest obstacles to making road traffic green. The lack of charging infrastructure remains a key barrier to adoption, even though around 60 percent of freight routes in Europe are shorter than the eActros 600’s 500 km range.
According to Karin Rådström, CEO of Mercedes-Benz Trucks, the eActros 600 pays about twice the high prices of its diesel counterpart, even though it is cheaper to run than a conventional truck.
Speaking in an interview with Bloomberg Television, Rådström said building charging networks is an urgent next step to ensure that shipping and logistics companies using electric cars can get the job done.
“That’s the most challenging part of the equation” for customers, Rådström said. He said hydrogen-powered trucks are also part of reducing trucking’s carbon dioxide emissions.
As emission regulations tighten, the region’s largest truck manufacturers are building a charging network together. Last year, the European Commission approved a joint venture between Volvo, Daimler Trucks and Traton, which plans to invest 500 million euros ($527 million) to set up 1,700 charging points across Europe in the coming years.
Although few megawatt chargers are currently available, the European Union has set goals to expand charging infrastructure for electric cars. The rules require that by 2030 at the latest, the EU’s main road network must be equipped with charging stations every 60 kilometers, in which case battery-powered trucks should be able to compete better with diesel cars.
