The News
A group of shippers led by Microsoft and PepsiCo is putting 2,500 battery-electric Class 8 trucks on US roads through a single order, announced this week by Catalyst Mobility and Smart Freight Centre, two clean-freight nonprofits. That nearly matches the 2,509 heavy-duty zero-emission trucks the US deployed from 2017 through 2025, by the count of Catalyst Mobility, then called CALSTART.
The deal takes the resale risk off the carrier but leaves the freight risk in place. ZET Financial, a leasing company, buys the trucks and leases them to carriers with nothing down, then takes them back when the lease ends.
Shippers take on far less, since the program’s page tells them that joining “does not imply a procurement obligation.”
Why It Matters
Resale value is the barrier that “has kept many carriers and fleets on the sidelines,” the release says.
Carriers: instead of owning a truck nobody can price five years out, they would take on lease payments for a truck whose freight is promised but not contracted.
Shippers: joining is cheap and buys “early allocation of trucks for your preferred lanes and hubs,” which counts for more while Tesla is expected to deliver only 5,000 to 15,000 Semis this year. How much freight they then tender is what pays the carrier’s lease.
Record diesel, at $6.53 a gallon in the latest federal reading, helps Tesla’s pitch that the Semi costs less per mile. Each carrier still has to prove that on its own lanes.
Know More
Tesla won the order through an RFP that weighed price, range, charging and production capacity. Carriers can pick Kenworth, RIDE or Volvo trucks instead when a Semi does not fit the job.
The trucks will run out of 10 hubs: Los Angeles, Stockton, Bakersfield, Seattle-Tacoma, Houston, Dallas, San Antonio, Chicago, Atlanta and the Newark-New York area.
Five shippers are named so far: Microsoft, PepsiCo, Brambles/CHEP, IKEA and Red Bull, out of “more than 15” the program page says are engaged. Carriers get “direct introductions to participating shippers and qualifying freight,” often ahead of diesel carriers.
That differs from the Google-backed Nevoya deal, where shippers buy certificates for electric miles on other companies’ freight. Here, the shippers’ own loads are meant to ride the trucks.
“What is different about ZET SCALE is that the demand was organized so manufacturers could price at scale,” said Michael Berube, Catalyst Mobility’s chief executive.
Peer Insights
Carriers and shippers facing the same question, who should hold an electric truck, have answered it four ways.
ABF Freight: bought two Semis outright, but only after a pilot on its Reno-Sacramento linehaul beat the fleet-average efficiency tracked by the North American Council for Freight Efficiency. The truck had to match “our most efficient diesel units,” president Matt Godfrey said.
WattEV: owns the 370 Semis it ordered for Oakland drayage, plus the charging depots, so carriers buy capacity rather than equipment, according to FreightWaves.
Einride: is deploying 500 Semis for Amazon and others, “fully financed with third party financing solutions,” and sells shippers the capacity, per its release.
GMA Trucking: asked carriers to bid on four-year contracts. One bidder said a three-year term would have raised its price by more than 45%.
Maersk signed with Einride in 2022 for 300 electric trucks and 150 chargers, a shipper-backed fleet much like this one, then ended the deal two years later.
Einride has sued, saying Maersk could not “live up to their own sales targets for electric capacity.” Maersk says Einride failed to deliver trucks and pay its vendors, per electrive.
Pushback
Freight is a real risk for a carrier that signs a lease, but trucks and power may run short first. PepsiCo reserved 100 Semis in 2017 and runs about 86 today.
Four other orders since spring already name about 1,220 Semis, from WattEV, Einride, Lincoln Transportation and IMC Logistics. ZET SCALE adds 2,500 more, against Tesla’s expected output of 5,000 to 15,000 this year.
Charging will also be settled hub by hub, since the program offers “private, shared, and public charging options” and each carrier plans its power alongside its lease.
What’s Next
Tesla hosts fleet customers at its Nevada Semi plant this week. The alliance is recruiting more shippers and carriers toward 10,000 or more trucks. The first carrier to name its lanes and its shipper will show whether the freight comes with a contract as long as the lease.
