Yes, because despite all of our pre-ordered Leafs supposed to be showing up in December of '10, they were late (granted, they had a tsunami, but that wasn't the only reason). And as far as I know, Nissan was the only one shipping battery cars.
The 2011 number doesn't include plug in hybrids, the later years do (with the plug in hybrids being the majority of 2012 sales and around half of 2013).
That they have sold so many is a good thing. Unlike Tesla, they don't have the advantage of selling into a market where people have a large amount of disposable income.
I would say that when cars like the Leaf, the sub 100 mile range club, get under twenty thousand after the government rebate then sales should really take off. I have no problem subsidizing the purchase of a reasonably priced electric like the Leaf or even as a stretch the i3 but once you pass into luxury pricing those people don't need the payout from the public
Gasp, a car that's been on the market for almost twice as long and costs less than half as much sold more, how crazy is that?
Still, I actually test drove a Leaf a while back, nifty car, and I applaud Nissan for doing what they are doing. Amongst the snooze fest that is the Japanese auto industry these days, Nissan definitely has some of the most interesting line ups, from affordable, super car performance (GT-R) to pure electric city commuter (Leaf).
Yes, a fact which will make any bus rider want to reach for his bazooka. Man, there is nothing more irritating than being stuck in the HOV lane in a bus in a traffic jam consisting entirely of teslas and leafs.
They should not call it the "HOV lane" since they allow non high occupancy vehicles (e.g. hybrid car, electric car, motorcycles).
My understanding was the HOV lane's purpose is to encourage car pooling (i.e. high occupancy). Allowing single occupant motorcycles and electric cars sort of defeats this purpose.
As always, the trick is to remember the purpose of the HOV lane: keep traffic moving. That's part of the reason motorcycles are allowed. It's considered safer to let a motorcycle stay in motion than be in stop and go traffic [1]. And having been stuck in the Dallas MixMaster since the I-35E N HOV was shut down, I can say holding a motorcycle half clutched for half an hour is dang near painful. This is also the reason motorcycles are allowed to ride the line in traffic jams (also air-cooled engines need to stay in motion in summer).
Plus, if you don't have a passenger seat, the bike's at full occupancy, which ought to be at least near high occupancy!
The naming is historical baggage. In practice, "HOV lanes" today serve two (intended) purposes: (1) reduce gridlock; (2) reduce pollution. As originally conceived, (2) could only be achieved by actual high occupancy vehicles being used to reduce the number of vehicles on the road. Now it can also be achieved by low- or zero-emission vehicles, hence the exception.
You seem to be assuming that HOV lanes are the result of some rational regulatory process. In fact, they have been shown in every study to disrupt traffic with little effect on carpooling.
HOV lanes are nominally intended to encourage more ecological use of transit resources, with congestion relief as a coincident effect (fewer cars on the road -> less pollution, lower energy usage, reduced rate of needing new transit infrastructure).
Since electric cars serve many / most of the same purposes, it makes sense to append them to a reward system which has already proven effective at driving adoption and retention of preferred behaviors.
If it's spare HOV capacity, then I agree. But if adding the electric cars to HOV lanes increases the congestion in HOV lanes, it might degrade their effectiveness in incentivizing the behaviors they currently incentivize. For example, the attractiveness of either carpooling or riding the bus declines if HOV lanes get slower. Carpooling in particular needs enough of a delta in the regular v. HOV trip times to make up for having to pick up the other carpool members (unless you live in the same place).
One solution is to allow a capped number in, to incentivize purchase but only up to a threshold that doesn't overly degrade HOV trip times. I believe that's what California did for hybrids, allowing HOV usage for the first N purchased.
NorCal still has a couple things that they can do to alleviate congestion in carpool lanes. They can extend the hours to the carpool lane, or even make it HoV for 24 hours a day (SoCal does this).
My guess is that in a couple years we will see 24 hour carpool lanes in NorCal.
Do you ever worry about running out of juice while driving? This is the only thing that prevents me, it's the situation where you don't have any juice but need it somehow. It would be great if you could put gasoline in it to generate electricity. It wouldn't even be used frequently (otherwise no point in saving money by using electricity only), just for emergencies.
The BMW has a range extender which is a gas engine that powers the battery. It gives you an extra bit of range, but I think you need it running over a long time, IE I don't think it can recharge as fast as you can drain the battery.
Did you even think this through before you posted or are you being spergy and pedantic on purpose?
If I run low on gas I can pull into any service station and get my entire 336 mile range back in 2 minutes. I would need hours to charge an electric car and the only place I could do that is at my house.
If I wanted to go down the shore for a day (60 miles each way) the Leaf would get me there, but then I'd only have 15 miles of range left and no place to charge, effectively stranding me.
and yet it is completely tasteless designwise. what an ugly, ugly car.
tesla is doing it right, the fiat500e is beautiful - why is it so hard to understand that design matters? the new BMW i3 is not exactly beautiful as well.
> why is it so hard to understand that design matters?
Maybe Nissan did understand that, which is how we ended up with the Leaf. You spend $32K on a car that's saving polar bears, you want the world to know it. How am I supposed to feel smug if I'm driving something that looks like a Nissan Versa?
Contrast that to the Tesla Model S, which IMO is kind of bland (though I'd still buy one if we didn't have the Leaf). A buddy of mine recently said he hadn't seen a Tesla. In Redmond, WA? I guarantee that he saw at least one or two on his way to work at Microsoft that morning. But if one isn't in to cars much, a Model S isn't really going to stand out.
I've seen that hypothesis floated for hybrid-electric cars also, in particular to explain why more conventional-looking cars like the Honda Civic Hybrid failed to make a meaningful dent into the Toyota Prius's marketshare.
> How am I supposed to feel smug if I'm driving something that looks like a Nissan Versa?
Wait what, I always thought the Nissan Leaf looked like an uglier Nissan Versa? Wikipedia says the prototype version was a Versa.
Personally, I've been confusing newer Volvos for Teslas a lot recently (both have the brand name written out in 5 letters across the back). The Tesla Model S looks reasonably nice, but like you said, it doesn't really stand out if you don't know what you're looking for. Personally I prefer that, if I were to buy an electric car I'd rather it look closer to normal.
The Teslas are rarer at Microsoft than I expected. Over the summer I made a point of looking for them. The Leafs were easy to spot and numerous. Meanwhile I remember one or maybe two Teslas.
In fact I saw more Ferraris than Tesla Model S. Without a doubt the Leaf is more noticeable and more popular.
The ugliness of it is the whole point. You care so much about the environment that you don't even care about silly superficial things like aesthetic design. If it looked desirable then there is a risk that people might assume you bought it for its looks rather than it environmental credentials and your smugness potential takes a serious hit.
People who buy alternative vehicles seem to cue in to "different" designs though. I always think of the 90's Prius vs. the 2000's Prius. The first Prius looked like an ordinary car; footnote in history. Most people don't even know it existed. The second looks distinct and a little weird; smash hit.
Agreed. My father, though not always a penny-pincher, embraced and supported the idea that he was a penny-pincher, of sound budgetary mind, and so forth. He bought a second-generation Prius not because of any environmental benefit (or not entirely: he had at that point worked in oil for 20 years, and still does), but because to him it showed off to the other folks in traffic "Gaze upon my daily fuel savings, ye mighty, and despair!"
I've been wanting a car with the "futurist concept car look" for years, but they seemingly never progress to mass production. It's good to see that that's finally happening.
>and yet it is completely tasteless designwise. what an ugly, ugly car.tesla is doing it right.
On the bright side it doesn't catch on fire. </snark> Keeping aside the snark, it doesn't look that bad. The low price tag and the comparable look of Prius makes up for it. I think Nissan and Telsa are competing on different demograph within the same market. Nissan is going after people who think of cars as a utility and are looking to save some $$ on their daily gas expenditure. While Tesla is going after the people who prefer luxury, style and trend.
I wouldn't call it ugly. Rather, it's a bit nerdy looking whereas the Tesla is all Luxury. I'd rather be seen driving the Leaf than a fancy Model S. I hope Tesla makes a design that is a little less expensive looking.
It's fugliness is part of the appeal. If it looked like any other Nissan (Sentra for example) then people wouldn't know you paid extra for an EV. For example, a friend has a Camry hybrid. I never knew it was a hybrid until it silently left our parking lot. He paid $4000+ (I think) extra and has nothing to show for it.
EVs on the other hand you, see them, you recognize something that ugly could only be an EV.
>He paid $4000+ (I think) extra and has nothing to show for it.
Besides the fuel economy that will hopefully pay for that investment over time.
Cars that shout "I'm saving polar bears!" may be needed to get enough early adopters but then hopefully the technology has enough benefits on its own that it becomes just another feature that people value for its own sake.
This is so nice, until you figure out that the electric car has been around since 1880: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_car. Now it's trying to claw its way to 0.1% of worldwide car sale - and let's not try to figure out which percentage of total cars used this represents (probably 0.00001%).
I know that after a tipping point adoption just starts snowballing, but that point still looks 10-12 years away (a market share of electric car sales at 10% or better).
Did you read the article? If so, where did you get 'unsuccessful' from?
Nissan LEAF launched in the United States in December 2010. The United States accounts for nearly half of the sales worldwide. The pace of LEAF sales has continued to accelerate. In 2013, Nissan sold 22,610 of the electric vehicles in the United States, more than twice as many as in 2012 and more than 2012 and 2011 Leaf sales combined.
Nissan LEAF traditionally has performed well on the West Coast with notable markets such as San Francisco, Los Angeles and Seattle, but now interest has expanded across the country. New hot markets have emerged such as Atlanta, which has been the No. 1 LEAF market for the past five months.
The things are everywhere around Seattle, so many that I've quit waving. There are four in the parking lot at work, including mine, and our company has less than 100 people.
Visiting my parents in Lakeland, FL for a week? I saw one parked in a guy's garage in their neighborhood, that's it. I'll see a half dozen Leaf's just on an eight mile drive to work on any given day. So it seems it could be geographically specific.
Seattle was one of the few pre-order markets (CA, Phoenix, and Knoxville, TN being the others, IIRC). So they had a bit of a head start. That may lead to a snowball effect. You're less likely to risk it if you don't know anyone who has one. But if your buddy the early adopter raves about his, you might be more likely to buy. For the first year I had ours (the first year they were out), I was frequently stopped in parking lots for 5-10 minute conversations about my experience with it (friends hated driving around with me <g>). But now that they're everywhere in Seattle, I'll bet it's been at least a year since someone has talked to me in a parking lot. My guess is that folks have gathered all of the information they need to decide one way or the other and no longer feel the need to solicit strangers for input. :-)
I guess since TN is a stone's throw away from NC, it stands to reason that the Triangle (Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill) sees its fair share of Leafs on the road as well (as I sit smiling and equally as smug behind the wheel of my Prius).
It's not that surprising given that stuff in America is far apart, and public transportation is terrible. A Leaf supposedly gets 70-100 miles on a charge. That's just barely enough for a daily commute for many people working in the East Bay or Los Angeles. And for anyone else who wants to travel, it can only be a second car. Until an electric car can be reasonably used to travel 500 miles in a day, I can't see one becoming my primary vehicle.
EDIT: Note that many Americans can only afford one car at a time.
In the UK there are quite a few electric charging points in public & company car parks, so the car could be fully charged by the time you're ready to drive it home, effectively doubling the range if you don't need to drive it during the day.
yep. I just hope the value doesn't drop like a rock once the credits end. This thing has to keep a little equity for the economics to work out for me. It's a little bit of a gamble.
Also, the federal isn't a credit, it's a discount off of msrp. The state is a deduction, so you typically have to carry it a few years to see the full benefit. Just in case anyone is curious.
> Also, the federal isn't a credit, it's a discount off of msrp. The state is a deduction, so you typically have to carry it a few years to see the full benefit. Just in case anyone is curious.
To clarify, there _is_ a $7500 federal tax credit, but Nissan just takes it themselves and passes those savings directly to the customer, which is what makes it possible to indirectly use the credit when leasing instead of purchasing.
The Georgia $5000 tax credit is indeed a credit, not a deduction, but it's a _non-refundable_ credit, meaning if you owe less than $5000 in taxes, you can only take a credit for that lesser amount the first year (so you're taxes are $0 instead of negative), but you get up to five years to take the full amount of the credit (in the case of this particular credit).
The Georgia credit applies in full even if you lease instead of purchase. I doubt that's what the legislature intended, but it's the case nevertheless.
Wouldn't the value increase once the credits end? The new model of the Leaf will suddenly cost $12,500 more, so demand for used Leafs will skyrocket. That could definitely increase the value of your car.
It's always interesting seeing these sorts of discussions. On HN, every now and then you uncover a conversation about what's financially reasonable, between the guy making $450k/year and the guy making $45k/year.
Many people don't want to spend $250/mo on gas. Whether they do or not is separate.
I had a Nissan Pathfinder once and it was okay when gas was $2-2.50/gal (16 gallon tank, $40/wk, $150/month). Once it got to $4.00/gal damn right I found alternatives to driving that Pathfinder. The 20 minute walk to the store in the hot, Florida sun didn't seem so bad anymore.
I have many friends who bought SUVs (for the "utility") and commuted way out from the exurbs. They had no choice but to eat the cost of $100 fillups while looking for cheaper alternatives.
Yeah, not sure what that guy is on about. Both prices are lower than the Leaf's nominal price, and I've heard you could get ~$10k worth of tax credits or something with the Leaf. Unfortunately I don't remember the details, but I met a guy who leased a Leaf who told me about all this. He got a pretty sweet deal on the lease too.
They're still flat out working to expand their factory to get the Model S built. According to interviews I've seen, most of the next 2 years will be slowly growing the factory size. They'd be selling 2-3 times more if they could actually build them.
Because Nissan was a little stupid and didn't include any sort of active cooling system for the battery. No heat pump, no liquid cooling, not even an air-cooled heat sink (unless you count the flat outer surface of the battery). There is a resistance heater, yes, and that helps in cold climates, but it does nothing beneficial in warm climates.
As a result, many (if not most) SoCal and Arizona owners have experienced quite significant battery degradation [0]. That translates into reduced range. Almost every other manufacturer includes some sort of battery thermal management system. That is why, for example, Tesla Roadster batteries average about 85% of initial capacity after 100,000 miles in real-world use[1].
8 years happens to be the length of the warranty on 2011/2012 Leaf batteries. Either way, combined with the optional $100/mo protection plan that gives you a new battery if yours ever loses 30% capacity, I doubt any Leaf buyers will be on the market before 2021 for any reason other than wanting a new car.
Haha, you wish; more likely prices will go up because petrol stations complain about not selling as much gas anymore, so they have to raise the prices to compensate.
The HN audience is really tough -- it requires that jokes actually be funny before reckoning them a net addition to the conversation. Preferably funny and insightful at once, but I've seen things substantially upvoted just for being very witty.
This is a Good Thing because it means HN discussions are less likely to get swamped under an avalanche of cheap jokes. (Cheap jokes are much easier than insight.)
