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Re:Tesla Semi, a Deep Dive by dsfyu404ed on Monday December 05, 2022 @07:52AM (#33864954)
Who has the financial incentive to build charging stations? Both out and back and point to point operators will build charging infrastructure at their own hubs/terminals and use them for themselves.

You might see truck stops adding "public" chargers after that EV trucks become commonplace (in the same way that truck stops have fuel discount programs for member fleets) but how will EV trucks going to become commonplace if private operators using their own infrastructure are 99.99% of users?

Truck stops are thin margin. I don't see them making the investment without a need. Maybe if a big player (e.g. Swift, Walmart, etc) wants to convert to EV and kicks in a bunch of money to have their fuel partner make the capital investment. But I don't think that's going to happen until EVs are so good that it's a "profitably without nearly any doubt" type investment. You'll probably need to see a decade or two of short haul EV trucks and the accompanying refinement before that happens.

Re:Tesla Semi, a Deep Dive by oxplot on Monday December 05, 2022 @08:08AM (#33865095)
> Who has the financial incentive to build charging stations? Both out and back and point to point operators will build charging infrastructure at their own hubs/terminals and use them for themselves.

Don't forget that Tesla will probably end up building the most number of chargers over time. Charging is its own business with its own margins (e.g. Supercharger network). In other words, it's a source of net income for Tesla so as they build more trucks, they'll build more chargers as they've done to date with passenger cars and Superchargers.

Re:Tesla Semi, a Deep Dive by supportlocal4h on Monday December 05, 2022 @08:29AM (#33865345)
It's interesting that Tesla hasn't made a splashy entrance into generation.
Re:Tesla Semi, a Deep Dive by infecto on Monday December 05, 2022 @09:18AM (#33865930)
I think in most states within the US, generation is a hard problem to solve because of state regulation. There are some outliers (Texas) but in general its hard to just start your own power plant thats connected to the grid.
Re:Tesla Semi, a Deep Dive by oxplot on Monday December 05, 2022 @11:23AM (#33867616)
> There are some outliers (Texas) but in general its hard to just start your own power plant thats connected to the grid.

What if it's not and solely powered by solar (just wondering - Megachargers most likely need help from the grid).

Re:Tesla Semi, a Deep Dive by supportlocal4h on Monday December 05, 2022 @11:41PM (#33876003)
Yep. Kinda like manufacturing cars is highly regulated. Or selling them without local dealerships. Or manufacturing industrial warehouse-sized batteries. Or building and operating an international network of charging stations.
Re:Tesla Semi, a Deep Dive by nine_k on Monday December 05, 2022 @11:13AM (#33867473)
They have a well-known solar roof program, which is generation, but home-scale.

Maybe a huge charging station which has to have large buffer batteries anyway would benefit from a large solar-panel field nearby / above it, if land price is acceptable. That would be a natural extension of the solar roof business.

Re:Tesla Semi, a Deep Dive by seanmcdirmid on Monday December 05, 2022 @10:51AM (#33867200)
Charging stations are cheap compared to diesel pumps, it’s not a huge logistical challenge, just some hardware, space, and an electrician to turn things on.

Chargers at truck stops can only be good for their margins, who would have to cater to people waiting for their trucks to charge on things they actually make money in (hint: it’s not diesel or electrons).