"Tesla has failed to produce a battery EV semi truck" is not strong evidence that it is impossible to produce one. Tesla has been having quite a bit of trouble in recent years, as its not-a-founder-but-wants-you-to-think-he-is makes promises reality can't deliver.

Now, it may be that you're right—that battery-powered semi trucks are unfeasible to build.

But a) this doesn't mean we should go all-in on hydrogen, either, and b) maybe what this really means is that we need to eliminate the semi truck as a common feature of our roads, and do most of our cross-country shipping by rail, which is massively more efficient no matter what means you use to power it. (Yes, that requires more investment in our rail infrastructure, but that would also be a very good thing on several levels.)

According to [1] US freight rail already transports 40% of long-haul freight and is the plurality of freight transport.

[1]: https://www.aar.org/facts-figures a biased source probably

You really notice the difference when you go to a country like Germany, which uses a lot more trucks to haul freight. The rail percentage is about 19% currently. [0] The Autobahn is packed with trucks. The percentage of rail traffic is lower in other EU countries apparently.

[0] https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/travel-logistics-and-inf...

The EV semi is in testing with real loads and works fine.

Yes it works with less than half of the 20-25 tons of cargo that a regular semi transports.

I don't know if the specs are public, but from what people have seen, it seems to perform mostly as advertised. Frito Lay is using them in earnest and happy with the results so far: https://insideevs.com/news/632312/tesla-semi-megacharger-at-...