Tesla is finally delivering the initial batch of its all-electric Semi trucks to buyers after almost ten years of postponements and enhancements to the vehicle first disclosed in 2017.

Company officials — with the exception of CEO Elon Musk, who attended a state dinner with President Trump and Chinese Premier Xi Jinping — walked an audience of customers, employees, and influencers through various details during an event in Reno, Nevada, on Thursday night.

Customers will be able to accept the delivery of the truck whenever they’re prepared, although charging infrastructure continues to pose a challenge, a source familiar with the situation informed TechCrunch under the condition of anonymity.

While the final purchase price has not been disclosed, the executives assured that the truck will assist fleet owners in minimizing their total cost of ownership, cutting emissions, and enjoying increased reliability.

The event took place at a newly established factory specifically for the Semi located next to the company’s first Gigafactory in Reno. Tesla aims to produce as many as 50,000 trucks annually at the facility, or about 1,000 each week, while generating 3,000 jobs for the local economy. The most advanced model of the truck is projected to achieve 500 miles or more on a single charge (depending on the load size) and cost just under $300,000 before incentives. There will also be shorter-range versions available.

The long-anticipated launch of the Semi arrives during a pivotal time for Tesla. Musk now describes Tesla as a robotics and AI company, despite the fact that nearly all its revenue stems from vehicle sales. He has also revised Tesla’s mission to “build a world of amazing abundance.” When he showcased the Semi in 2017, Tesla’s mission still focused on “accelerating the world’s transition to sustainable energy.”

Regardless of the shift in positioning, and apparently priorities for Tesla, the event on Thursday still saw extensive discussions about decreasing trucking emissions. Dan Priestly, who leads Tesla’s Semi program, pointed out that heavy trucks contribute to 16% of emissions, despite representing merely 1% of vehicles on the road.

“We’re extremely excited to be incorporating these into our own operations because it’s fulfilling the mission we originally set out [with],” he stated.

‘Sometimes we get a bit too ambitious’

Initially planned to go into production in 2019, the Semi faced several delays. Factors including the pandemic, a global shortage of parts and semiconductors, and adaptations stemming from pilot customer feedback all contributed to the prolonged wait.

Priestly and Lars Moravy, who oversees most of Tesla’s engineering operations, elaborated on many of those modifications during the 30-minute event, timed to illustrate a Semi that charged from 3% battery up to 60% while connected to one of Tesla’s megawatt charging stations. (Tesla is also constructing an entire network of these chargers, which Priestly elaborated on during the event.)

Some changes are significant and straightforward: the company has reduced the vehicle’s weight by roughly 1,000 pounds compared to its earlier version. Others are more specific, such as moving from three different oils in the Semi’s drive axle to a single type.

Moravy mentioned that the previous axle design requiring three different oils had “always frustrated” him, acknowledging that Tesla tends to favor “super bespoke” designs. Priestly added that modifications to the motor design and contributions from Tesla’s lubricants team enabled the elimination of the other two oils. “Sometimes we get a bit too ambitious,” he remarked.

Tesla also had to adapt to address issues with the side windows. In its original design, the company used pop-out windows that didn’t fully open, and for years, everyone from actual truck drivers to automotive bloggers pointed this out as an obvious flaw.

On Thursday, Priestly offered an apology. He termed the original design “not adequate” and disclosed that the new Semi now features standard roll-down windows.

“We fully acknowledge we were mistaken about the windows,” he said. “It turns out there’s a lot of infrastructure in the world, whether it’s a badge reader, a toll booth, or conversing with someone on a call box. There’s all sorts of things right at that height, and it became clear that we needed a roll-down window to better interact with that infrastructure.”

“It’s okay to be wrong, Dan,” Moravy added.

However, Tesla seems to have succeeded with its aim of creating a truck that can travel 500 miles on a single charge while fully loaded.

That assertion, which Musk made during the original event in 2017, was a source of skepticism for many years. One of his most prominent critics was Bill Gates, who claimed in a 2020 blog post that electric big rigs would “probably never be a practical solution” because “batteries are large and heavy.”

Without directly mentioning him, Moravy and Priestly humorously referenced Gates during Thursday’s event: “We’re quite relentless about every watt-hour we pursue in these vehicles because there’s this wonderful compounding effect, [which] is if you make the vehicle more efficient, it means you need less battery to accomplish the same amount of work, which allows you to reduce the battery from the vehicle, which decreases cost and mass,” Priestly indicated.

“We had some critics, names shall not be disclosed,” Moravy continued.

“But, well-known names,” Priestly countered.

“And at Tesla, we welcome when people assert that something is impossible. So we took on that challenge,” Moravy stated.

While Musk was absent, he did record a segment that aired before the event commenced. In the video, he mentioned the Semi will be the “most enjoyable truck to drive.” He also assured that Tesla’s partial automation features (notably absent from the Semi despite the delays) will be incorporated in the “near future.”

Musk also presented the truck as making “a ton of sense economically, because the cost of electricity per mile is significantly lower than that of diesel, especially in these turbulent times” — although that final point conveniently overlooks the fact that diesel prices have surged due to the president Musk helped elect initiating a war that has disrupted energy markets.