Sandy Munro impressed by the Edison Motors semi. In fact it is a diesel electric designed for truckers hauling logs. Diesel electric is a decades old proven technology that makes a lot more sense than the double drivetrain hybrids. These semis will be using a lot of regenerative power as they mainly haul logs downhill. That gives them a huge fuel economy advantage over diesels.
The Captain
How large is the battery? Enough to climb back up mountain with all electric? Or mostly diesel?
Seems all electric up the mountain to get a load, then load and truck on way down is regenerating enough to get you back up again. (Sounds too good to be real, but they weren’t being super specific in this video.)
It has a diesel generator underhood for longer trips or if you don’t get a full recharge. Neat thing for a six month build.
I once drove a log truck for two days, and it sounds utterly logical and real to me. New cut logs are extremely heavy, and outweigh the trucks by a great deal. The tremendous structural strength and stability of the logs (correctly loaded!) allows the truckbed to be very light.
d fb
(The experienced Teamster driver was injured in a bar fight, and I was the only guy they could find who was available to work and familiar with using compound low transmissions, and there was no more room for logs at the end of the skid line where the trucks loaded, so I got dispensation and well paid work)
Log truck drivers are the most highly paid of all truckers. They are also the most skilled of all.
There was a similar claim about a truck in an open pit mine. Those dump trucks are also really huge and the mine was on a hill. That’s the same geography as the Cerro Bolivar iron mine in Venezuela that US Steel was exploiting. The ore was taken by train to Puerto Ordaz to be shipped to the US.
In the video Sandy Munro said it made a lot of sense but keep in mind that the truck is a prototype and only field testing will confirm the claim.
The Captain
The Orinoco Mining personnel manager told me that Puerto Ordaz had the highest birth rate in Venezuela. The train was equipped like EVs with regenerative breaking except the energy was fed into huge air cooled resistors that made a tremendous racket. The train arrived around midnight and what else are you going to do in the middle of the night…??? 
Not following closely, but in an open pit mine the trucks are working against gravity, bringing up the new spoil from the pit to the surface, then heading back down empty.
In the logging world, the trucks are coming downhill, and using gravity and the heavy load with regenerative braking to charge the batteries before heading back up the hill empty. While it might not be a perfect 100% exchange, I can see how this particularly use could be made to be much more efficient than a pure diesel.
In the case of the EV mining dump truck it was/is actually mining at higher elevations than it was delivering the ore. Thus regenerated more than it consumed overall.
Mike
OK, I can certainly see that working. But I thought the OP was “open pit mining”. Every one I’ve seen (several, including the Bingham Copper Mine in Utah) is a big hole in the ground, even if it’s elevated on a mountain.That means bringing spoil “up” and empty trucks back down. But I’m all in favor of gravity, that’s the truly endless supply.
The OP said
Later I used the term Open Pit which I agree is confusing. What do you call mining a hilltop. Open hill? 
The Captain