Tesla Confirms Rare New Delivery of 50 Electric Semi Trucks to Chicago
Tesla's official account announced that the first 50 Semi trucks for Chicago are already en route to the city. The order is linked to HMD Trucking, though the company did not name the client.
In Tesla's post, the client was not specified. However, the order is associated with HMD Trucking—a carrier based in the city that operates a fleet of over 650 trucks, nearly all of which run on diesel. The company received its first Semi on November 2 and refers to it as the first Tesla truck registered in Illinois.
HMD will primarily use the first electric trucks for local routes around Chicago. The carrier is installing its own charging stations, as Tesla's Megacharger network is currently focused mainly on western routes. This summer, HMD tested the Semi over a distance of more than 4,000 miles: the average consumption was 1.74 kWh per mile, matching Tesla's stated figure of 1.7 kWh per mile.
Henry Malukas, owner of HMD Trucking, told MotorTrend that the deal is worth approximately $15 million—around $300,000 per truck.
Tesla does not disclose the actual production volume of the Semi. The company states that its Nevada factory is designed to produce 50,000 trucks per year but has not published a timeline for reaching that capacity. In quarterly reports, Semi deliveries are not broken out separately: Tesla only accounts for passenger vehicles sold to customers there.
