At Nissan’s Oppama plant near Tokyo, there are more than 700 automated guided vehicles, or AGVs, which deliver parts to workers in a car factory. Nissan, along with 4R Energy, is now repurposing used EV batteries, which no longer have enough capacity to provide sufficient EV range, to power its AGVs. The first-generation LEAF was… Read more »
Redwood Materials, the battery recycling venture founded by former Tesla CTO JB Straubel, has signed an agreement to recycle scrap and defective battery cells for Envision AESC, which manufactures batteries for the Nissan LEAF in Smyrna, Tennessee. Recycling batteries is not only environmentally sound, but it may soon become an economic necessity, as demand for… Read more »
Carbon fiber reinforced plastic (CFRP) was once seen as an ideal body material for EVs, because of its high strength and light weight. It was used in the Tesla Roadster and the BMW i3, but fell out of favor because of its high cost. Now Nissan has developed a new production process that speeds up… Read more »
A major government trial of vehicle-to-grid (V2G) technology in Australia will demonstrate the Nissan LEAF’s ability to supply energy to a home or commercial site, or to feed power back to the grid, thanks to its built-in bidirectional charging capability. The Realising Electric Vehicle Services (REVS) project is a precursor to the customer launch of… Read more »
Nissan was an early EV pioneer, but although the LEAF is still a common sight on the streets, sales have been flat in the US. In Japan, however, things look different. According to Nikkei, the LEAF and Nissan’s hybrid models accounted for 25% of sales in fiscal 2018, and the company aims to expand this… Read more »
4R Energy, a joint venture between Nissan and Sumitomo that focuses on EV battery reuse, will be the first group certified to the UL 1974 Standard for Evaluation for Repurposing Batteries. UL 1974 outlines how to sort and grade EV battery packs, modules, and cells, identifying state-of-health and determining viability for second-life use as storage…. Read more »
Nissan’s Global Director of Electric Vehicles, Nic Thomas, recently took a trip Down Under for the Australian launch of the Nissan LEAF Plus. In his speech, he highlighted the LEAF’s bidirectional charging capability, which he said is already being used in Japan, and is expected to be available in Australia within months. Nissan Australia’s Manager… Read more »
Over the past few years, we in the EV media have been highly critical of automakers for failing to advertise their EVs (and then claiming that there’s no consumer demand for them). So it’s only fair that we praise them now that they’re starting to release some pro-EV ad spots. Several TV campaigns have referred… Read more »
Data collected by Nissan indicates that a LEAF battery should last as long as 22 years, according to Francisco Carranza, Managing Director of Renault-Nissan Energy Services. Nissan monitors various parameters, including charging patterns and battery degradation, on the over 400,000 LEAFs it has sold in Europe since 2011. Carranza did not discuss the issue of… Read more »
If you pay an electric bill (and who doesn’t?), keep your eyes open for a message from your local utility announcing that you can take advantage of a $3,500 rebate on a Nissan LEAF. Nissan has been partnering with various utilities around the US to offer customers a special rebate. The rebate comes from Nissan,… Read more »