‘Last week, I got to attend the Plug-In Vehicle Show in San Jose, California. I drove the new Nissan …Leaf. It’s an all electric car, and it is fabulous. It has great pick-up, plenty of room, and a remarkable sophisticated instrument system. It has, for example, a moving map that shows a target pattern telling you how far you can drive from where you are with the amount of battery energy you have left. I very much hope to get one someday. It is the first all-electric vehicle I’ve driven that I would be allowed to own. The electric car future is just about here.”
So how do we test drive a Nissan Leaf in the Bay Area? Oh, we only needed to have an immensely successful Science show geared for kids, a catchy name, and a well into triple digit IQ. I guess we’ll have to wait a bit longer for our chance…
GE Introduces Smart Grid-Compatible Electric Vehicle Charger
* GE WattStation™ is an easy-to-use electric vehicle charger designed by renowned industrial designer Yves Behar
* Will help utility companies manage electricity demand, expanding consumer access to electric vehicle charging stations
* Significantly decreases time required for full car charging
SAN FRANCISCO, CA, July 13, 2010 – GE (NYSE: GE) today introduced the GE WattStation, an easy-to-use electric vehicle (EV) charger. Designed to help accelerate the adoption of plug-in electric vehicles, GE WattStation significantly decreases time needed for vehicle charging and, using smart grid technology, allows utility companies to manage the impact of electric vehicles on the local and regional grids.
Steve Fludder, vice president of GE ecomagination, said, “Widespread electric vehicle adoption depends on having charging stations that integrate the need for quick charging with the personal need for easy functionality. GE WattStation will meet this challenge.”
Combining functionality with consumer friendly form from renowned industrial designer Yves Behar, the GE WattStation on average decreases electric vehicle charging time from 12-18 hours to as little as four to eight hours compared to standard charging “level 1″, assuming a full-cycle charge for a 24 kWh battery.
“Good design is when a new technology enters our life and makes it simpler, beautiful and healthy” said Yves Behar, founder of fuseproject. “The GE WattStation achieves this with a welcoming design that is seamlessly integrated in the urban landscape and becomes a natural part of our daily driving routine”
Dan Heintzelman, president & CEO GE Energy Services, said, “For more than 100 years GE has worked to optimize energy use. Given our expertise in electrical distribution, WattStation is a natural progression in our commitment to creating cutting edge innovation for the next century.”
GE WattStation will be commercially available globally in 2011. GE will unveil a specialized home version of the charger later this year.
In addition to the GE WattStation, GE recently announced two new partnerships to advance electric vehicle adoption. In April 2010, Project Get Ready, a non-profit initiative led by Rocky Mountain Institute to help communities prepare for electric vehicles, named GE a technical advisor focusing on design and planning of the local and regional electric grids for electric vehicles.
In May 2010, GE Global Research and Nissan signed a separate three-year Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to explore new technologies that are needed to build a reliable, dynamic smart-charging infrastructure.
For more information on GE WattStation, including preorder details, please visit www.ecomagination.com/wattstation.
Just when you thought you had the perfect vehicle to creep up on people, animals, and the blind community, Nissan decided to take all of the fun out of it. While they have a point that it is safer for everyone to hear an otherwise mostly silent car, they picked a mix of Star Trek, and the pounding, anxiety inducing active sonar sounds from Das Boot. Thankfully Nissan has added a kill switch to turn the noises off (they turn off anyway past 18mph), but next time you turn the car on, the noises will return.
Suffice to say I’ll have a DIY removal posted a few hours after I get my Black SL…
A petition is starting. Hopefully someone in DC sees this! While these videos are old with the proposed sounds added in, they get the annoying sounds across well.
Scouring the ‘net for tidbits of news, and found this little gem. Courtesy of jaimev at www.mynissanleaf.com, here is a video taken at the Amgen Tour of California:
Sadly there isn’t any video from inside the Leaf, but there are some really cool shots of the under car aerodynamics. Looks like quite a bit of buzz going on in that tent, so we hope a few more orders came through for Nissan!
Well, we all know to make LEAFs you need to have plants (sorry, bad pun), but for us in the United States, it’s great to hear that one is going to open on our side of the Pacific. While the LEAFs are currently being produced in Japan, Nissan just broke ground on a new plant in Smyrna, Tennessee, and starting in 2012 not only will the LEAF be made in that town, but also the batteries.
What does that mean for the USDM market? 1,300 more jobs in the EV sector will be created, as we’ll need to ramp up production to meet the already insatiable demand. The plant is gearing up to be capable of producing over 200,000 advanced technology batteries annually.
The battery plant is located next to the current production plant that is currently getting retooled to produce the LEAF. Currently the Smyrna plant produces the Maxima, Altima, XTerra, Frontier, and the Pathfinder. There is no word yet on which vehicles will remain in production there when the LEAF starts, or what models might see a reduction in production.
The current plant in Smyrna cost Nissan around $2.1 Billion USD, and their new plant is planned to cost $1.7 Billion USD. Nissan isn’t on the hook for the full amount upfront though, as Nissan took a $1.4 Billion USD loan through the Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing Loan Program.
We can’t wait to see more American jobs in the green sector, and sales for hundreds of thousands of EV’s each year!
‘Last week, I got to attend the Plug-In Vehicle Show in San Jose, California. I drove the new Nissan …Leaf. It’s an all electric car, and it is fabulous. It has great pick-up, plenty of room, and a remarkable sophisticated instrument system. It has, for example, a moving map that shows a target pattern telling you how far you can drive from where you are with the amount of battery energy you have left. I very much hope to get one someday. It is the first all-electric vehicle I’ve driven that I would be allowed to own. The electric car future is just about here.”
