Nissan CEO Sparks Talk of Electric Cars
by Jasmin Malik Chua, Jersey City, USA on 07. 2.07
Although Nissan has been lagging behind Honda and Toyota in the hybrid-tech race, an all-electric Nissan car by 2010 may not be completely far-fetched.
Carlos Ghosn, the company's CEO, told reporters last week that Nissan was hard at work developing the next generation of smaller, lighter auto batteries, which bodes well for hybrids and electric cars alike.
The lithium-ion batteries are already common in portable tech such as laptops and cell phones, but they have yet to be widely adopted by car manufacturers in the construction of their engines. (Tesla Motors, which will be rolling out its electric cars by this fall, is one exception.)
"We continue on the lithium ion battery. We think for us it's a competitive advantage," Ghosn said. "We have a lot of technology is this area, and we think this is going to be very helpful, not only for hybrids but also for electric cars."
Ghosn said that Nissan was serious about going one step further than its competitors and introducing vehicles powered only by electricity.
"If you have an efficient battery for a hybrid, why not go all the way and go for electric cars?" he asked. "It has zero emissions of anything."
Nissan is in talks to put a fleet of electric cars in the Japanese market, which would necessitate infrastructure such as charging stations. Ghosn declined to provide further details, only saying that the number of cars would be in "the hundreds." :: The Houston Chronicle
See also: :: Nissan Will Build Altima Hybrid in Tennessee, :: Nissan Confirms Hybrid Model for 2010, and :: Nissan and NEC To Make Lithium-Ion Batteries For Hybrids
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I love the thought of the return of the 'Electric' powered vehicles, having seen many of them as a child in Chicago during the 1940's. I rode many 'electric' Streetcars. Many trucks were 'Electric' powered and chain driven, which gave them a unique sound as they drove past. The Edison Company, described in one of my past posts, told about the beginning and efficiency of the Electric Power Grid, as we know it today. (Thomas Edison, Samuel Insull).
I would love this car in the Progressive Southern States of the USA where the numerous Hydro-Electric Dams and Nuclear Power generating is common. The only fear that I have is the Zeal driven activists that want to remove the Dams and the Nuclear Generating facilities. Only to replace them with the fractional efficiency Wind and Solar systems.
http://daflikkers.blogspot.com/
Excellent! I hope this becomes reality.
One of the first things I thought when I saw the GM Volt hybrid concept, is they resureccted the electric car and hoped it would run if you removed the gasoline motor!
This quote: "The lithium-ion batteries are already common in portable tech such as laptops and cell phones, but they have yet to be fully adapted to the rigorous demands of a car engine...." does not account for the Tesla Roadster (www.teslamotors.com) which will be shipping to the first purchasers in a couple months, about 3 years before Nissan gets there. I know treehugger's covered the tesla bunch of times, but maybe it's helpful to correct inaccurate reporting in the Houston Chronicle?
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JMC: Thanks, eagle-eyed Steve! I've amended the story to include this.
yay! rhd full electric, ill buy one.
HOPE they look at nanosafe as it looks awesome as. no thermal runaway, 3min charge, no heavy metals, 12year life, 10k+ cycles. that in a japanese built full electric that has a 7sec or lower 0-100k performance with ultra long service intervals. bit of thin film on the roof to boot. with no less than 200miles battery life (or a cant drive home to mummys til australia puts in infacsture). this i'd sell my kidney to buy... not really, but id spend alot for it. even more if theyd make it faster. ;p
i have 4 years left on my current car warranty, and i REALLY want japanese full electric to be my next car. i dont believe in hybrid middle products.
i hope they think about the plugin thing a little, if they are smart the will make a home cord that can pass data down the cable like the data-over-power products we have, and make it easy to upload your tunes, gps maps and dvds to the car, download car mileage data, gps routes, performance stats, warnings etc. (wireless is a little lacking in bandwidth to knock this over while you sit and watch). whilst providing UPS to the house off the awesome nanosafe batts, and helping the car-to-grid idea. and solar, and vertical wind. *sigh*
this is the stuff my dreams are made off and is quickly becoming a short term goal in my life.
love it. hope nissan goes hard at it and puts all the right things together in their plans and bypass the others rather than just trying to keep up. even with the likes of tesla (whom rock).
Even if good batteries can come about. It would be great for kits and conversions.
vsk
no need to research li.ion.
nimh is already available tested and proven 10 years ago.
Hypocrites and Liars they are.
You realize that "recharge stations" have to get their energy from somewhere.
Usually that is fossil-fuel-powered powerplants, so the emissions will still be there, just generated in a different location. Now, if solar power generation was an efficient method of power generation...
They had technology back 10 years ago that allowed EV1, one of the first full electric car by GM, to run 350miles per charge. However, for some mysterious reason, GM recalled ALL the EV1s then destroyed them, citing they are profitable. We could have came a long way if GM continued to develop EV series... so to hear that we may hear a full electric vehicle in 10 years is nothing but an excuse from the pressure created by the oil companies.
I hope this ain't another ruse in the whole of things.I wish Nissan would hit hard and get totally electric vehicles in but, for now I'll wait .
"nimh is already available tested and proven 10 years ago."
I assume that you are alluding to the RAV4-EV, the battery pack for which cost $26,000 (more than a whole ICE powered RAV4) and for which Toyota was summarily sued for infringement of a patent which is owned by an oil company. So while NiMH powered electric cars sound like a good idea, the reality is that they aren't likely until someone can find a way to make them cheaper and without violating the patent.
Go Nissan, Go Nissan. It's your birthday. Got your game on !!!!!!!!!