

Nissan Leaf  (Source:
It will produce the Leaf in Tennessee starting Thursday








Source: The Detroit News

Comments     Threshold


RE: Good
By CharonPDX on 1/10/2013 10:11:58 AM , Rating: 2
"afraid of rising electricity costs"?

Let's assume you have a short/medium-length city commute of 10 miles each way.

A Prius, getting 50 miles per gallon, at $3.00 per gallon of gas, will cost you $24 per month. (20 work days.)

A Leaf is rated at 34 kWh/100 miles. Electricity prices in the US vary wildly, from about 6 cents per kWh to about 20 cents per kWh. So yes, in the most expensive part of the country (Hawaii,) a Leaf will cost more than a Prius per mile. But everywhere else (including second-and-third-most-expensive states NY and AK,) the Leaf will be cheaper (At NY's current rate, is a draw.) In the vast majority of the country, the Leaf will be a clear winner, with my location (Portland, OR) coming in at about $10 per month. If I were to use more expensive 100% renewable power, it would come to $15 per month.

As for the battery swapping, yeah, the Leaf doesn't have this easily. The Tesla S does, with Tesla saying that they will create "battery swap centers" where you can bring your car in and either have your battery swapped out with a fresh fully charged one of equal capacity for a small fee (they hinted it should be about as much as filling up with an equivalent amount of gas,) or swap out for a larger battery, leasing the larger battery for slightly more (to take longer trips, for example.)

And they're trying to make it a VERY fast swap process, automated, so that you could pull in, swap, and leave in less time than filling a gas car. The idea would be to have these spaced close enough that you can do true long distance driving, with stops approximately equal in length to using a gas car. (I haven't checked to see the status of how far along they are in this process, though.)

RE: Good

RE: Good
By conquistadorst on 1/11/2013 9:19:47 AM , Rating: 2
I was just in Hawaii for a few weeks. While I am sure there are some, I did not personally see a single EV my entire vacation. This really surprised me because they had wind generators and solar panels on every home galore. And yes, I drove ~700 miles so I spent a good deal of time on the road and not just in the parks and beaches. After weighing the costs, it really made perfect sense to never see an EV because an increased cost to electricity makes an EV uneconomical from every angle. I agree with CharonPDX, rising electricity costs would completely annihilate the EV market. ***UNLESS*** gas prices also rose proportionally which also cannot be denied as a possibility.

Also, unfortunately, your math may be a little off because it does not include delivery costs from the utility. In some bills, the "delivery charges" can account to nearly half the bill which includes both flat rate and a per KWH costs.

