Tesla made headlines last year by successfully delivering its all-electric semi-truck, known as the Semi. Now, the company is in discussions about potential government funding to construct Megacharging stations along the route from California to Texas.
The automaker has asked for $100 million in government funding from the United States to construct nine charging stations for its Semis, as reported by CleanTechnica and Bloomberg. These stations are planned to be strategically located between Northern California and the southern border of Texas. Each station is designed to include up to eight individual 750-kilowatt chargers, allowing eight Semis to charge simultaneously at each of the nine stations. Additionally, the company has called on Texas state officials to make requests to the federal government in support of securing the funding.
In 2017, the prototype for the Tesla Semi was unveiled, but it wasn’t until 2022 that the truck made its way onto the streets, with PepsiCo acquiring 15 of these groundbreaking vehicles.
The Tesla Semi marks a significant milestone as the first all-electric sixteen-wheeler to enter the market, as reported by CleanTechnica. Embracing clean energy vehicles like the Semi in industrial shipping is crucial for mitigating the harmful effects of planetary overheating by reducing the pollution generated during the transportation of goods.
To put things into perspective, back in 2015, the United States saw a staggering 49.5 million tons of goods being shipped daily, equivalent to 56 tons per person annually, necessitating over a billion barrels of oil, according to data from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). It’s worth noting that while this figure encompasses various modes of transportation, trucks have emerged as the fastest-growing contributor to hazardous air pollution, as stated by the EPA.
Vehicles like the Tesla Semi, powered by clean energy sources, provide companies with a means to transport their products between locations without relying on dirty energy sources that directly contribute to the concerning issue of planetary overheating. News regarding Tesla’s funding approval is anticipated later this year, though it remains uncertain whether the company will invest its own resources in the initiative if the government rejects its request.
