Family Energy Day in San Diego

Exploring the Nissan LEAF up close

Today Nissan brought a pre-production LEAF to San Diego that was about 99% production, according to some of the Nissan folk on hand. And it was the first LEAF that we have seen in Brilliant Silver. One wonderful aspect of the event was that the car was open to the public and anyone could get in and check it out. One interesting aspect of the LEAF on display – they had the shifter taped into place with clear shipping tape and yellow “caution” tape to ensure that attendees didn’t accidently slip the LEAF into gear and mow down other attendees!

While my wife and kids checked out the solar powered kids cars in another area of the parking lot, I spent some time evaluating the interior of the LEAF and talking with both Nissan and ECOtality reps. This is what we found.

The battery is expected to easily meet Nissan’s published numbers of 70-80% useful battery life remaining in ten years time. While repeated consistent use of DC quick charging may have an impact on battery life it is not expected to be significant. And the two words in the previous sentence that were emphasized to us were “repeated” and “consistent”. In other words, for most people driving the LEAF under 100 miles per day, there would be no significant impact if occasional DC quick charges were performed. While there is still no “official” definition of “repeated” or “consistent”, their use implied that one would need to DC quick charge many times each week for this to even be a consideration impacting battery life. Certainly good news for those of us thinking of using this functionality periodically and buying instead of leasing. If battery life is a concern, it was recommended that with leasing you pass battery life risk back to Nissan, and replace current technology with newer technology in three years. As previously written, your personal situation should guide you in making the lease vs. purchase decision.

While inspecting the interior, I sat in the back seat on the passenger side. Another attendee slipped into the back seat on the driver’s side. Asking my seat mate if it would be okay with him, I asked the “driver” to slide the seat all the way back, which he did. The gentleman sitting next to me was 6’2″ (I asked). His knees were not touching the back of the front seat, nor was his head brushing the interior of the roof. Now I’m not saying that there was a lot of extra room there, but certainly we could have driven like this with everyone being comfortable. So it seems that there is adequate room inside for four full-sized adults. If you want to put three in the back, it would be best if they are kid-sized. Or very friendly.

In speaking with the folks from ECOtality we learned a little more than we knew going in. While we thought that installation would begin this fall, it seems that it is more likely that residential installations will begin about two weeks prior to vehicle delivery in December (based on delivery date), and then public infrastructure will begin installation early in the first quarter of 2011. The plan is to have all public EV Project EVSE installed nationwide by June of 2011 with residential installations continuing until all in the project are installed.

I took a few photos but another attendee has taken significantly more than I did, and probably much better quality. If you would like to take a look at them, here is a link.