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Nikola Motor Receives Over 7,000 Preorders Worth Over $2.3 Billion For Its Electric Truck (electrek.co)
An anonymous reader writes: Last month, Nikola Motor unveiled the design of its first product -- an electric truck with a natural gas range extender called 'Nikola One.' The 'Nikola One' comes equipped with a massive 320 kWh battery pack that the company hopes can allow it to travel up to 1,200 miles with the natural gas range extender. Today, the company announced it has received over 7,000 pre-orders with deposits for the electric truck since its unveiling. CEO Trevor Milton says the pre-orders are worth over $2.3 billion. Milton said in a press release this morning: "Our technology is 10-15 years ahead of any other OEM in fuel efficiencies, MPG and emissions. We are the only OEM to have a near zero emission truck and still outperform diesel trucks running at 80,000 pounds. To have over 7,000 reservations totaling more than 2.3 billion dollars, with five months remaining until our unveiling ceremony, is unprecedented." Some other features of the truck include: 6x6 100% electric drive, zero idle, many times cleaner than diesel engines, half the fuel cost per mile compared to diesel, 3,700 FT. LBS Torque, 2,000 horsepower, one million miles fuel free, regenerative braking, and never plug-in feature as the turbine charges the batteries automatically while driving. This may sound familiar as the Tesla Model 3 received over 115,000 preorders worth $115 million in just 24 hours after its unveiling.
Its great to see electric cars to be leading, but what about the energy generation? It has to become "green" as well in order for there to be an impact.
A rig hauling 80,000 lbs is going to have a constant power requirement of about 150HP to maintain 65MPH on flat, level ground. No help from aerodynamics or bearing drag. That's over 110kW, or about 3 hours on battery, or 190 miles. That means the remaining 1000 miles of range are going to come from fossil fuels. Hardly impressive.
2,000 Horsepower is nearly 1.5 MEGAWATTS. 250,000 watts per motor. Even if they were 90% efficient, that's still 25kW of heat to dissipate. So, I imagine the 2000 horsepower is only available for a very short time, if it's even real.
The math just seems to fantastical to be true.
It looks like that's about $100k more than the new Peterbuilt extended-cab trucks.
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
Their preorders are actually $1500 x 7000 = $10.5 million. If all of those translate to sales, then it would be the big $2.3 billion number. To date Tesla has over 373,000 preorders at $1000 apiece = $373 million. Tesla stands to make over $15.6 billion in revenue if all of those sales go through, assuming an average build is about $42,000 after options. I think it's still pretty impressive for Nikola, though, all things considered.
The 'Nikola One' comes equipped with a massive 320 kWh battery pack that the company hopes can allow it to travel up to 1,200 miles with the natural gas range extender.
And my fart-powered motorcycle can travel 400 miles with its gasoline-powered range extender!
The claimed energy costs of /half/ over conventional diesel is huge. When your company does nothing but ship those costs will affect the bottom line pretty much like nothing else.
It reminds me of the advent of diesel-electric locomotives. They were so much cheaper to run that steam vanished virtually overnight. There were literally stories of steam locomotives rolling off production only to make a single trip directly to the scrap yards. (Said machines were contracted and commissioned years in advance)
If these trucks really do half the fuel cost, diesel will be gone in less than two years. And anyone who can't replace their fleet will simply be pushed out of business. (Anyone wonder why modern companies live and die based pretty much on their ability to secure credit?)
Worth every penny.
Lifetime fuel cost for vehicles like that is more than half a million dollars.
https://www1.eere.energy.gov/vehiclesandfuels/pdfs/truck_efficiency_paper_v2.pdf
According to the original post, these trucks have half the fuel cost of diesel.. So over the lifetime of the truck you'll save 150,000 dollars. Now imagine you own a large company with a fleet of thousands of these. It's easy to see while they're selling so well.
And that's just fuel cost. If there has been anything that the hybrid passenger car market has taught us it's that electric drive trains are crazy reliable and cheap to maintain. I'd be willing to bet they will save on maint too. Big diesel engines cost a lot just to keep on the road, and keep up to emissions spec. These new vehicles will have much less trouble with emissions.
So, it's basically a down-scaled diesel-electric locomotive, but with a battery buffer and diesel replaced with CNG?
Pretty much, without the rails off course. Diesel-Electric vehicles don't quite exist yet for general roadway use most likely because space, cost and power would trade off and the resulting savings negligible. (Natural) gas engines can be much smaller and operate at much higher efficiencies and thus less affected by stringent exhaust and other regulations.
Once batteries exist that can supply the surges required of a rail train (currently Diesel-Electric locomotives use capacitors) we will see the switch happen quickly there as well.
It always did make me wonder why companies like Tesla or even GM don't go for the commercial market first. Savings on a vehicle used 1/24h are minimal, a vehicle used 12-24h/day is much more attractive to save even 10% in TCO.
Custom electronics and digital signage for your business: www.evcircuits.com
Nikola Tesla didn't have middle name.
Tax credits flowing to corporations through the hands of consumers is politically acceptable.
Once the products are genuinely economic, they sell to business.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
Did anybody see this: Nikola Zero 520HP four-wheeler? Woohoo!!!!
Karma: Bad
It's more than drive train costs. Brakes are also a massive cost in big rigs, as are the pollution controls that may have to be upgraded several times over the life of the truck. The new challenge is going to be getting repairs for the gas turbine and the electrical systems, but those skills will pop up fast in the repair shops. If these can be delivered as promised and are at least as reliable as existing trucks, they're going to remake the market.
You can never go home again... but I guess you can shop there.
They're not the first company to do this (Smith has been doing it for ages), but the tech keeps converging. And pairing it with a range extender is a good idea, it's not as much of a cost or mass penalty (proportional to total hauled mass) in a freight truck as it is in a car, so you might as well retire any range anxiety. That said, 100-200 miles range is no slouch in and of itself. It depends on what sort of charge setup they provide, but it might fit well into a role shuttling goods around town where there's some delay on each end for charging - ports, factories, warehouses, etc.
And lest anyone think that you can't provide power that fast with detachable connectors... so long as you have a good enough feed, you can provide power fast enough to fry the batteries on that thing in seconds. AMP provides power to docked ships at up to 6600V and up to the ballpark of 8MW. Enough to fill one of those trucks' packs every 2 1/2 minutes, if they could actually take it. Technically you don't even need that big of a feed from the power plant, if you get a battery buffer.
Monkeywrench Ex Machina.
If you go to the site https://nikolamotor.com/one you will notice that the reserve price of the truck is only 1,500 USD... so take 7000 pre-orders and you have around 10.5 M USD. Perhaps they are thinking of the total price of the truck? so 2.3 B / 7000 = 329k for the truck.
330K for the Truck sounds like a lot, except a standard 18 wheeler cab is ~130-180k, andif the fuel savings are correct, its a no-brainer.
The first is that they need not 1 engine, but multiple smaller engines. By going with smaller engine/gens, they can turn on-off as needed. In addition, it makes it far more durable with the redundancy, but also easy to maintain by taking them out to rebuild/fix.
The second is that CNG is the wrong fuel. CNG is far too easy to bleed off. Instead, with LNG, it will not bleed off, and this can lower the GHG.
The third is they really do need the ability to recharge the battery at a station. It is far cheaper to recharge those batteries from the grid than from the nat gas. And with 320 KWH, well, that is a lot of energy that can be grabbed.
The last is the trailers, really need to be modified. In particular, they should have a motor/axle in the rear. This will not only help to accelerate, but also for re-gen.
BUT, otherwise, that is one heck of a truck.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Unlike most of you I went to the Nikola Motors website.
While there is undoubtedly some hype here's what they said.
There are 2 electric motors on the front axle and it looks like 4 electric motors on the rear axles. The motors have 2 gear automatic transmissions. The truck has what they call torque vectoring which adjusts the wheel speed while turning or maneuvering. There is a 100 gallon CNG tank powering a nearly 400 kw turbine. The turbine if fuel agnostic running on diesel, gasoline or CNG. You can choose your fuel at the time of purchase. They claim the 100 gallon CNG tank is enough for 800 -1,200 miles depending on terrain and load. The turbine will run for 1 hour out of every 3-5 hours of pure electric driving. It of course had regenerative braking but there are also air powered disk brakes on all 6 wheels (of course they'd have to have an air system so they can hook up to the trailer brakes too). They claim the truck will stop in about half the distance of a normal diesel rig.
For the first 25,000 customers they are offering free fuel for the first million miles. They own the rights to some gas wells and are setting up 55 fueling stations around the country and Canada that are spaced close enough that you can easily make if from one to the next. You can lease the truck for $5,000/month and that includes free fuel, warranty and scheduled maintenance (I doubt tires are included) and at the end of the warranty period (72 months or 1 million miles whichever comes first) you can trade it in on a new one. They also say the Nikola-one is around 2,000 pounds lighter than the equivalent diesel tractor increasing the payload you can carry.
Lots more information at the website.
Uhm, that's because there is no motor in the front and so there is no hood. The cabin starts right above the front bumper, leaving more cabin length compared to a standard lorry. I doubt the whole thing is longer.
...Swiss mountains with abundant hydro-electric dams and a couple of wind turbine sprinkled,
I smuggly look down on your fuel-burning CO2-vomitting electric plants~~~
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
That is what it is, its designed like a diesel locomotive, only real difference, it runs on roads and not tracks.
So, it's basically a down-scaled diesel-electric locomotive, but with a battery buffer and diesel replaced with CNG?
Pretty much, without the rails off course. Diesel-Electric vehicles don't quite exist yet for general roadway use most likely because space, cost and power would trade off and the resulting savings negligible. (Natural) gas engines can be much smaller and operate at much higher efficiencies and thus less affected by stringent exhaust and other regulations.
Once batteries exist that can supply the surges required of a rail train (currently Diesel-Electric locomotives use capacitors) we will see the switch happen quickly there as well.
It always did make me wonder why companies like Tesla or even GM don't go for the commercial market first. Savings on a vehicle used 1/24h are minimal, a vehicle used 12-24h/day is much more attractive to save even 10% in TCO.
Well at least its an actual TRUCK not an oversized car with a huge, open-air trunk!
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
Hydro-electric dams cause more greenhouse warming than coal
Yes, but No actually.
(methane caused by stagnate water and anaerobic metabolizing of dead plant materials under water), but there's plenty of other toxins coal emits.
Long story short: A hydro dam (specially in alpine regions) has more in common with mountain lakes than with swamps.
- The water isn't stagnating that much (the whole point of a dam is not to keep the water forever sequestered, but to use its flow to produce electricity. The artificial lake forming is only a *temporary* storage of energy - like a big battery).
- Water in colder/high altitude region is less likely to encourage proliferation of anaerobic bacteria deep in the water.
- Both (water flow and seasonnal cold temperature causing currents inside the lake) increase level of oxygen in (artificial-) lake water, favorising more aerobic metabolizing compared to what is typically found in swamps.
- Colder climate among other means less water loss in normal operation. The level won't go that much down simply because it's dry and hot (as opposed to more power output needed). Depth contributes to the above effect.
- Mountain lake (and dam) configuration is different, they tend to be deeper (they happen/they get constructed in valleys which were dug by glaciers), which again contribute to above effect.
- Banks around alpine damns are steeper, meaning less vegetation forming between low and high water level, less biomass is injected to rot (and anyway it tends to rot less in this water as said above)
- Why let good wood rot at the bottom of a flooded valley ? Lots of the biomass get lumbered away as precious resource.
All the above (and much more factors) brought the realisation that the greenhouse warming caused by hydro-electric dams has been grossly over estimated. They actually end-up being more environmentally friendly than previously taught and more than fossil-fuel burning power plants.
Specially the deeper (as found in alpine regions) artificial lakes in colder/higher altitude region.
On the other hand, shallow dams in tropical area are a very bad idea (even from a mosquitoe point of view if you want to ignore the carbon impact).
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]