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"In Tokyo, Renault/Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn made it clear: Nissan is going to be an electric car company par excellence. Speaking at the Foreign Correspondents&amp;#039; Club of Japan prior to the Tokyo Motor Show and later at the show itself, Ghosn said Nissan will bring its Leaf EV to fleets in 2010 and sell it to private customers by 2012 in the U.S., Europe and Japan. What&amp;#039;s more, there&amp;#039;ll be a Zero Emissions choice in the Infiniti lineup as well (&amp;quot;Zero Emissions,&amp;quot; of course, being Nissan-speak for an EV).   Ghosn and other Nissan officials here in Tokyo stress that the Leaf will be a real car, one that&amp;#039;s neutral to the environment, fun-to-drive (a term that exists, exactly in these words, in Japanese) and &amp;quot;a practical EV that motorists would want to use every day.&amp;quot;   At the company&amp;#039;s Grandrive proving ground, I drove EV-11, like the EV-2, a car featuring the coming Leaf&amp;#039;s EV powertrain. The EV-11&amp;#039;s structure is Nissan Versa, a car a bit smaller and narrower than the Leaf; its front drive features refinements of Leaf control systems. This prototype exhibited all the proper EV traits of instantaneous torque off the line, completely transparent transition from regenerative to friction braking \u2014 and eerie quietness.   Pricing won&amp;#039;t be discussed until next spring, with an announcement of purchase/lease options. The company has said that with local, regional and national tax breaks and incentives, the Leaf will be competitively priced in the range of a well-equipped C-segment car (say, its own Altima, peaking at around $30,000). With this as a target, many think &amp;quot;buy the car/lease the battery&amp;quot; will be one of these options. In fact, some say it would be impossible to meet the $30K target otherwise.   Much of the Leaf&amp;#039;s mechanicals have already been announced. An 80-kW electric motor drives its front wheels; a laminated lithium battery pack jointly developed by Nissan and NEC stores the energy. The company feels strongly that EV batteries are core components, things that should be manufactured in-house, not bought from suppliers. At the moment, its batteries all are made in Japan. Two other manufacturing sites are planned: one in the U.K. and the other, aided by federal loan monies, in Smyrna, Tennessee.   Other new information from my Tokyo visit includes details of the battery pack. It&amp;#039;s an array of 48 modules, each weighing 7.7 lb. and consisting of 4 laminated cells. The total battery pack, including its protective surround, is around 440 lb.   Range on a city cycle like our own LA4 (patterned after a trip around downtown Los Angeles) is expected to exceed 100 miles. On the other hand, city cycle testing doesn&amp;#039;t use the air conditioning, and it&amp;#039;s said the Leaf would take around a 20-percent hit with a/c in use. Figure summer range in a real L.A. at more like 80 miles.   A 200-volt 15-amp outlet can recharge the Leaf in approximately 8 hours. Ghosn estimated that most homes in America could be made Leaf-ready for around $500. Other company spokesmen stressed a goal for one-stop shopping, the purchase or lease deal including a Nissan-designed charger \u2014 quite a nifty one looking almost like a conventional gasoline unit.   An onboard ITS (intelligent transportation system) supports EV operation by identifying the car&amp;#039;s accessible reach at its current state of charge; it also shows nearby charging stations (with regular updates). A smart phone is able to set the Leaf&amp;#039;s air conditioning, check its current state of charge, activate charging \u2014 and even let you know when it&amp;#039;s topped up. This, and an electric motor&amp;#039;s instantaneous scoot right off the line. There&amp;#039;s a brand-new EV world coming! "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.roadandtrack.com/car-shows/tokyo-auto-show/news/a15005/2010-nissan-leaf/>