Nissan

With recent studies showing electric vehicles would cover the needs of the vast majority of car owners in the US, nationwide availability of electric vehicles has never been more important. A new study from the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) paints an interesting picture of EV availability in the US, praising Tesla, BMW and Nissan for their nationwide availability, and shaming Honda and Toyota for their little effort in making plug-in vehicles available.
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EV enthusiasts are patiently (or not) awaiting some more details on Nissan’s rollout for its next generation electric vehicles, and more specifically on the upcoming 60 kWh battery pack that will power the next LEAF. Now the company is hinting at more performance electric vehicles coming to its lineup.
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Back in 2007, Nissan and NEC, a Japenese tech giant, created a battery manufacturing company, Automotive Energy Supply Corporation (AESC), in order to eventually supply the automaker’s electric vehicle programs. Both companies have since each invested hundreds of millions in the venture, which started producing the battery cells for the Nissan Leaf in 2010.

At some point in 2014, it became one of the largest electric vehicle battery manufacturers, second only to Panasonic, Tesla’s battery cell supplier. The joint-venture has since lost market shares and Nissan has been quite opened about looking to partner with someone else for future EV programs, like it’s new 60 kWh battery pack.

Now we learn that the automaker is looking to sell its shares in AESC and Panasonic could be a buyer.
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Nissan today in Rio unveiled its BladeGlider “working prototype” which combines electric powertrain with a futuristic design and moderate 268 horsepower split between two rear 130kW electric motors. Max speed is quoted as nearly 200km/h (125 miles/hour), with 0-100km/h (0-62) taking less than five seconds.  No information was given on the battery pack size but as this is a two model exhibition car, it is likely to differ in a big way from any possible related production car.

The system features torque vectoring, controlling the torque delivered to the driven wheels, improving the handling even further. With torque vectoring, if the car starts to understeer, it automatically sends more torque to the outside wheel to restore the handling balance. Designed to add to the driving experience rather than govern it, the torque vectoring system has three settings: off, agile and drift mode. Power is supplied by a high performance, five module lithium-ion 220kW battery. Bespoke cooling systems have been developed for both the battery and the motors.

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While Nissan has upgraded the LEAF’s battery pack in its latest version with now a 30 kWh option, the low energy capacity of the vehicle is still a major factor dragging it down. Potential buyers would like to see better options with more range.

Nissan engineers actually built a LEAF with a bigger battery pack, but unfortunately, it is not intended for production and was built during their spare time.
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Nissan was the first to introduce an upgraded battery pack to one of the mainstream electric cars, the LEAF’s new 30 kWh pack, and was only recently followed by BMW with the i3’s new pack and soon the VW e-Golf with its 2017 battery pack.

We were expecting that the new 30 kWh pack, which brings the LEAF’s range to 107 EPA-rated miles, would help erase its poor sales performance in the US in 2015 with 17,269 units versus 30,200 in 2014, but as it turns out, Nissan’s LEAF sales are still in free-fall in the US and the Tesla Model 3 could have something to do with it.
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Today, Nissan announced a deal to provide 110 Nissan LEAFs with the new 30 kWh battery pack to La Ciudad del Taxi, a Madrid-based taxi company. The automaker is calling the transaction “the world’s largest 100 percent electric taxi fleet deal”.

The new 30 kWh battery pack option for the 2016 models gets 107 EPA-rated miles on a single charge.
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Nissan announced a major vehicle-to-grid (V2G) trial project with Enel, a multinational power company, in the UK. The automaker has been exploring V2G systems almost as long as the Nissan LEAF program existed and its latest project is the first of its kind in the UK and one of the company’s biggest to date.

Nissan and Enel will install and connect 100 V2G units (see picture above) for Nissan LEAF and e-NV200 owners.
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Tesla has mostly welcomed electric vehicle competition since it contributes to its mission to accelerate the advent of electric transport, though it didn’t stop CEO Elon Musk to literally laugh at competition on occasions. Nissan is another automaker with a strong commitment to EVs and it has a similar approach to competition in the market.

CEO Carlos Ghosn commented on Tesla having received an impressive number of Model 3 reservations since unveiling the all-electric $35,000 sedan last week and he referred to the vehicle as “good competition.”.
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We were very impressed last year when Nissan unveiled the IDS concept at a preview of the Tokyo Motor Show. At the time, the company described the concept as the embodiment of its vision for electric vehicles and self-driving cars going forward. This week, the company featured the concept at the Geneva Motor Show to announce what it calls its “Intelligent Mobility” vision.

Vision aside, the IDS concept features several technologies expected to make it into Nissan’s cars in the near future, especially its 60 kWh battery pack, which is expected to be featured in the next generation LEAF, and its Piloted Drive on the autonomous front, which should be available later this year in Japan and in Europe in 2017.
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Nissan released this week a video of an intelligent “self-parking” chair concept leveraging its own self-driving car technology. The short video is worth a watch.
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Nissan released today its January sales report for the U.S. and revealed that LEAF sales are down 29.4% versus the same period last year. Until late in 2015, the company had the excuse of the upcoming 2016 models, which were affecting sales negatively as potential buyers were waiting for the upgrade, but the new cars arrived at dealerships and December was still a very disappointing month for Nissan’s all-electric vehicle.
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Nissan released its December and 2015 sales reports for the U.S. and LEAF sales are down 42.8% in 2015 versus 2014. Until December, the company had the excuse of the upcoming 2016 models, which were affecting sales negatively, but the new cars arrived at dealerships last month and December was still a very disappointing month for Nissan’s all-electric vehicle.
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Nissan announced a partnership with Enel, Europe’s second largest power company for installed capacity, to develop a new “Vehicle-to-Grid” initiative to use, store and return to the grid electricity in excess from Nissan’s electric vehicles.

The initiative appears to be a revival of Nissan’s “LEAF to Home” program, which appears to have been abandoned years ago. Although the new program seems to be more focused on providing a service to the grid rather than backup power, which was the focus of “LEAF to Home”.
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Nissan announced that it will unveil the “Fuel Station of the Future” in partnership with Foster + Partners, a British architecture and design firm. Interestingly, Nissan features the all-electric LEAF in a short preview video for the station.
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A major new partnership between Blink, BMW, ChargePoint, Nissan and EVgo was announced today at the LA Auto show. The five partners created the ROEV association with the goal to access all 3 charging networks with a single account.

Between them Blink, ChargePoint and EVgo operate more than 17,500 electric vehicle charging stations or about 91% of all stations in the US.

Full press release below:
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Nissan had its press briefing today for the opening of the Tokyo Motor Show 2015 and the Japan-based company reaffirmed its commitment to electric vehicles with 3 new EVs on stage.

Watch Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn’s presentation below the break:
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