EV Semi Emissions Calculator

Enter a fleet size, a daily route, and the engine era of the diesel trucks being replaced. You get the CO2 ledger with the grid's own emissions counted honestly, plus the NOx and PM2.5 that vanish from the neighborhood air entirely, because an electric truck has no tailpipe.

Number of trucks

Miles per truck per day (drayage runs usually finish under 200)

Operating days per year

Diesel engine era being replaced

Diesel fuel economy (mpg) (6.0 is the NACFE regional-haul average)

Electric semi energy use (kWh per mile) (1.7 is the real-world Tesla Semi figure)

Grid powering the chargers

Custom grid intensity (lb CO2 per kWh) (optional, overrides the pick above)

Diesel price per gallon (optional, for the cost comparison)

Electricity price per kWh (optional)

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Data reviewed: August 2026. Figures here come from published sources and change over time. How we verify

How the EV semi emissions calculator works

Before the numbers, the picture. The dirtiest trucking in America is often the shortest: drayage, the port-to-warehouse shuttle that moves a container twenty or fifty miles and comes back for another one. The routes run through the same neighborhoods every day, the trucks idle in the same gate queues, and drayage fleets have historically run the oldest diesels in the industry. If you live beside a port corridor, the exhaust is not an abstraction. It is the air on your street. That is why replacing exactly these trucks with electric ones is the sharpest version of the electric-truck story, and it is the scenario this page prices.

The calculator runs two ledgers at once, because diesel exhaust is really two different problems. The first is CO2, which is global: a ton emitted at the Port of Long Beach warms the planet the same as a ton emitted anywhere. Here the electric truck is better but not innocent, so we count both sides: the tailpipe CO2 the diesel no longer emits, minus the CO2 the grid emits to make the charging electricity. The second ledger is the local one: NOx and fine soot (PM2.5), the pollutants tied to asthma, cardiovascular disease, and shortened lives near freight corridors. These act where they land, and for them the electric truck is not merely better. Its tailpipe number is zero, because there is no tailpipe. Every factor in both ledgers comes from a published source, listed at the bottom, and every default is editable.

The formula

annual miles = trucks × miles/day × days
diesel CO2 = (miles ÷ mpg) × 10.18 kg per gallon
electric CO2 = miles × kWh/mile × grid lb CO2 per kWh
net CO2 cut = diesel CO2 − electric CO2
NOx or PM2.5 removed = miles × engine-era grams per mile

The 10.18 kg per gallon is EPA's figure and it is chemistry, not engineering: the carbon in a gallon of diesel becomes that much CO2 no matter how well tuned the engine is. The 6.0 mpg default is NACFE's average for Class 8 regional haul. The 1.7 kWh per mile default is the real-world Tesla Semi figure from NACFE's monitored Run on Less Electric DEPOT event, not the brochure. Grid intensities are EPA eGRID 2023 data. The engine-era grams per mile come from port and corridor measurement studies and are the heart of the page; more on them below.

Worked example

5 electric semis replacing a typical mixed drayage fleet, 175 miles a day, 250 days a year, at 6.0 mpg and 1.7 kWh per mile on the US average grid:

Annual miles = 5 × 175 × 250 = 218,750. The diesel side: 218,750 ÷ 6.0 = 36,458 gallons × 10.18 kg = 371.1 metric tons of tailpipe CO2. The electric side: 218,750 × 1.7 = 371,875 kWh × 0.77 lb per kWh = 129.4 metric tons of grid CO2. Net: 241.7 metric tons of CO2 cut per year, a 65.1% reduction. By EPA's equivalency factors that is like taking 56 passenger cars off the road, the electricity emissions of 50 homes, or 4,029 tree seedlings grown for 10 years.

And the neighborhood ledger: 5,739 lb of NOx and 57.4 lb of exhaust PM2.5 per year that no longer go into the air beside the route, because the electric trucks' tailpipe figure for both is zero. Switch the grid to California, where most real drayage electrification is actually happening, and the CO2 cut climbs to 298.9 tons (80.5%). Switch it to the coal-heavy Midwest grid and the cut shrinks to 162 tons (43.7%) but does not disappear: diesel is simply that carbon-intense per mile. The local air numbers do not move at all, whatever powers the charger.

Why the engine era matters more than anything else on this page

Two federal deadlines carved the diesel fleet into eras, and the differences are not subtle. Model year 2007 effectively mandated the diesel particulate filter (DPF), which cut exhaust soot by more than 90 percent. Model year 2010 brought the NOx standard that made selective catalytic reduction (SCR) standard equipment, and NOx fell by a similar share. A pre-2007 truck has neither. Port measurements put such a truck around 20 grams of NOx per mile in drayage service (the Houston drayage study measured 19 to 28 g per mile in ordinary driving, and more inside the port gates), roughly the per-mile NOx of 667 brand new gasoline cars meeting today's Tier 3 fleet average. A 2007 to 2009 truck has clean soot but old NOx: we use 18 g per mile, because measurements at the Port of Oakland found DPF-only trucks' NOx close to the older group. A 2010-and-newer truck is far cleaner at about 5 g per mile in low-speed drayage duty; that is our reading of ICCT's in-use data (1.1 g per bhp-hr in urban driving, about triple the certification limit, SCR runs cool at creeping speeds) bracketed against the Port of Oakland's measured 69 percent reduction versus older engines. Three tiers is as fine as we can honestly slice it: published per-mile measurements do not support ten, and we would rather use fewer numbers we can defend than more numbers we invented.

The default, "typical mixed drayage fleet," is our own disclosed blend: half 2010-and-newer, three tenths 2007 to 2009, two tenths pre-2007, which works out to 11.9 g of NOx and 0.119 g of PM2.5 per mile. That is an editorial estimate of a legacy-leaning national fleet, not a measured figure; California ports now require 2010-or-newer engines, so if your scenario is a CARB-compliant fleet, pick the 2010+ tier and the savings will honestly shrink. That is the point of the select: the answer depends enormously on which diesel is being replaced, and this page would rather show you that than hide it in an average.

What this page deliberately leaves out

An honest estimator names its edges. Brake and tire particles are not exhaust and do not go away with the tailpipe; the brake share genuinely shrinks because regenerative braking slows the truck with the motor instead of the pads (measured reductions in brake wear PM2.5 run roughly 64 to 95 percent), but tire wear remains and a heavy battery does not help it. Upstream fuel emissions are excluded on both sides in one direction that favors diesel: refining and hauling diesel adds roughly 20 percent to its ledger (the well-to-tank share in GREET-style analyses), so the net CO2 cut shown here is conservative. Grid intensity varies by region and by hour, and overnight depot charging does not always match the annual average we use; the custom field is there for a reason. Battery manufacturing is a real one-time carbon cost outside this per-mile page, paid back fastest by exactly the high-mileage, old-diesel, clean-grid scenario this page describes. And noise: an electric semi is dramatically quieter than a diesel at drayage speeds, which portside neighborhoods notice immediately, and we make no attempt to put a number on it. Quiet is real; we just will not pretend to quantify it.

Sources

Where the numbers on this page come from. We go to the body that publishes the figure, not to another calculator. Figures on this page were checked against these sources in August 2026. See how we verify.

Greenhouse Gas Equivalencies Calculator, Calculations and References, US EPA. The fixed-chemistry 10.18 kg of CO2 per gallon of diesel, and the equivalency factors: 4.29 metric tons CO2e per passenger car per year, 4.798 metric tons per home's electricity, 0.060 metric ton per tree seedling grown for 10 years.
Carbon Dioxide Emissions Coefficients, US Energy Information Administration. Corroborates the diesel figure: 10.19 kg (22.45 pounds) of CO2 per gallon.
eGRID Summary Data, 2023 data (Rev 2, June 2025), US EPA. Grid CO2 rates used here: US average 767.2 lb per MWh, California (CAMX) 428.5, Texas (ERCT) 733.9, coal-heavy Midwest (SRMW) 1,239.8. EIA's separate 2023 estimate of about 0.81 lb per kWh corroborates the national figure.
Run on Less, Regional haul, NACFE. The 6.0 mpg average for Class 8 regional haul, our editable diesel default. Fleet-wide Class 8 surveys land at about 5.97 to 6.24 mpg, which corroborates it.
Run on Less, Electric DEPOT (2023), NACFE. The 1.7 kWh per mile real-world figure for the Tesla Semi, confirmed by PepsiCo's operational data during the three-week monitored run. A real-world number, not a brochure number.
Measurement and Analysis of the Operations of Drayage Trucks in the Houston Area, Journal of the Air and Waste Management Association (via PubMed Central). Measured per-mile drayage emissions: roughly 19 to 28 grams of NOx per mile in non-port driving for pre-2010 engine groups, and far higher inside the port gates. Anchors our older-truck NOx and PM tiers.
Effects of Particle Filters and Selective Catalytic Reduction on Drayage Truck Emissions at the Port of Oakland, Environmental Science and Technology (Preble et al., 2015). Measured about 1,400 real drayage trucks: DPF plus SCR engines (2010 to 2013) emitted 69 percent less NOx and 92 percent less black carbon than 2004 to 2006 engines. Anchors the era steps in our tiers.
Current state of NOx emissions from in-use heavy-duty diesel vehicles in the United States, International Council on Clean Transportation. Real-world NOx for 2010-and-newer engines averages about 1.1 g per bhp-hr in urban driving against a 0.2 certification limit. Anchors our modern-truck tier at low drayage speeds.
Regenerative braking system effectively reduces the formation of brake wear particles, Journal of Hazardous Materials. Regenerative braking cuts brake wear PM2.5 by roughly 64 to 95 percent depending on how aggressively it is used. The honest footnote on non-exhaust particles.

Frequently asked questions

How much CO2 does a diesel semi emit per mile?

Burning a gallon of diesel produces 10.18 kg (about 22.4 pounds) of CO2, and that is fixed chemistry, not a tuning question. At the 6.0 mpg NACFE average for regional haul, that works out to roughly 1.7 kg (3.7 pounds) of CO2 per mile. A truck running 175 miles a day, 250 days a year, puts out about 74 metric tons of tailpipe CO2 annually, roughly what 17 passenger cars emit in a year.

Are electric semis really zero emission?

At the tailpipe, yes, because there is no tailpipe: zero CO2, zero NOx, zero exhaust soot in the neighborhood the truck drives through. At the power plant, no: charging carries the grid's carbon, which this calculator counts honestly. On the 2023 US average grid an electric semi at 1.7 kWh per mile is responsible for about 0.6 kg of CO2 per mile, roughly a third of what the diesel emits. The CO2 answer depends on your grid; the local air answer does not.

Why do old drayage trucks pollute more?

Two federal deadlines split the fleet into eras. Diesel particulate filters were effectively mandated on 2007 model year engines, cutting exhaust soot by more than 90 percent. Selective catalytic reduction arrived with the 2010 NOx standard, cutting smog-forming NOx by a similar share. A pre-2007 engine has neither, and port measurements put its NOx around 20 grams per mile, four times a modern diesel and the per-mile NOx of several hundred new gasoline cars. Drayage fleets have historically run the oldest trucks in trucking, which is why the neighborhoods next to ports feel it most.

What is drayage?

The short-haul leg of container shipping: a tractor picks a container up at a port or rail yard and moves it to a nearby warehouse, usually well under 200 miles in a day, then comes back and does it again. Routes are short, repetitive, and return to base every night, which happens to be the exact duty cycle where today's electric semis work best. It is also why the same city blocks get the same exhaust every day.

Does a dirty grid make an electric semi worse than diesel?

For CO2, almost never in practice. Even on the coal-heavy SRMW grid, the dirtiest big region in EPA's eGRID data at about 1.24 lb of CO2 per kWh, an electric semi at 1.7 kWh per mile is responsible for about 0.96 kg per mile against the diesel's 1.7 kg, still a cut of more than 40 percent, because diesel is simply that carbon-intense per mile. And for the local pollutants, the grid does not matter at all: the NOx and soot removed from the street the truck drives on go to zero regardless of what powers the charger.

How much electricity does an electric semi use per mile?

About 1.7 kWh per mile in real-world service. That figure comes from NACFE's Run on Less Electric DEPOT event in 2023, where PepsiCo's Tesla Semis were monitored for three weeks of actual deliveries, including a truck that covered more than 1,000 miles in a day. Loaded weight, terrain, and weather move it, so the field is editable, but 1.7 is an observed operational number, not a spec sheet claim.

What about battery manufacturing emissions?

They are real, and this per-mile page does not model them. Building a large truck battery is a one-time carbon cost that the truck then pays back through years of lower per-mile emissions, and the payback arrives fastest exactly where this page points: high-mileage trucks replacing old diesels on cleaner grids. Lifecycle studies consistently find the electric truck ahead over its working life; how far ahead depends on the grid and the miles.

Do electric trucks still make brake and tire pollution?

Yes, and honesty requires saying so: brake and tire particles are not exhaust and do not go away with the tailpipe. But the brake half genuinely shrinks, because regenerative braking slows the truck with the motor instead of the friction pads. Measurements put the reduction in brake wear PM2.5 at roughly 64 to 95 percent depending on how much regen is used. Tire wear remains, and a heavy battery does not help it. This calculator counts exhaust only and says so.