leaf

Rather than cranking up a generator during a blackout, Nissan Leaf drivers may be able to tap into the electric car's batteries.

Nissan earlier this week unveiled its Nissan Leaf to Home system, which it plans to commercialize in Japan within a year.

The system uses the Leaf charging station to draw from the car's lithium ion batteries and feed current into a home's electricity distribution panel. The 24 kilowatt-hours of energy storage in the Leaf is enough to power an average Japanese home, which uses about half the energy of an average U.S. household, for … Read more

Nissan has just launched a pair of apps for the Android and BlackBerry platforms that put control and information about the automaker's electric Leaf at owners' fingertips.

The app connects to the vehicle via the CarWings system that is present in all Nissan Leafs (Leaves? Leafii?) and features a tabbed interface that is broken into six major sections. The Home tab is where you can view your Leaf's current battery level, whether the car is plugged in or not, and how long a quick, normal, or trickle charge will take. The Home screen also displays a graph with … Read more

Remember when Tesla sued "Top Gear" over its portrayal of the electric Roadster running out of electricity and breaking down? Now Nissan is complaining about the show's portrayal of the all electric Leaf.

In a show that aired at the end of July, "Top Gear" presenter Jeremy Clarkson drove the Nissan Leaf to the city of Lincoln, where it ran out of electricity and had to be pushed by helpful bystanders to a charging point.

But Nissan executive vice president Andy Palmer, in an interview with the U.K. newspaper The Times, said "Top … Read more

In addition to filling a prescription, picking up some shampoo, or grabbing a candy bar, a Walgreens customer will now be able to charge a Nissan Leaf or Chevrolet Volt while shopping.

The nation's largest drugstore chain announced that it will install about 800 charging stations outside stores in several major markets, including New York, Boston, Chicago, and Washington, by year's end.

"According to the Department of Energy, Walgreens will make up as much as 40 percent of all public EV charging stations across the country," Mark Wagner, Walgreens president of community management and operations, said … Read more

The Nissan Leaf Nismo RC was captured on video as it ran demo laps as part of the 2011 24 Hours of Le Mans, and also at the Silverstone Circuit in England.

The all-electric race car, which debuted at the 2011 New York auto show, has a 3.9-inch shorter wheelbase. Its height has been lowered by 13.9 inches curb, and it has a curb weight of 2,072 pounds.

But the Nismo RC still remains very much its production counterpart. It has, for example, the same motor and inverter, and the same battery pack as the Leaf, as … Read more

Nissan Leaf owners may be happy to know that after their vehicle's battery is retired, in its second life it will be put to good use, still powering EVs.

Nissan and 4R Energy Corporation announced development of a new solar-powered charging station that uses old Leaf batteries to store solar energy. The test station was revealed last week at Nissan's global headquarters in Yokohama, Japan. Three 50kW fast chargers and four standard EV chargers draw energy from the equivalent of five 24kWh Leaf battery packs that get their energy not from the grid, but from photovoltaic cells mounted … Read more

Nissan today launched the 2012 model of the Leaf electric sedan, adding more features and a bigger price tag starting at $35,200.

The automaker said it will start taking new reservations on August 4 for the 2012 model year Leaf and make it available beyond its initial launch market to new states in the southeast and Illinois.

The upcoming all-electric Leaf will come in two trim levels and make popular options of the 2011 Leaf standard. The suggested retail price for the SV trim is $35,200, which is $2,420 more than this year's model, and the … Read more

Looking through the EPA listings for 2011 model year cars, we picked out the most fuel efficient and compared them by a few different data points. Topping the EPA list is the 2011 Nissan Leaf, with its massive 99 mpg equivalent fuel economy. This number represents the combined city and highway mileage.

The 2011 Chevy Volt is more difficult to place, as the EPA lists two fuel economy figures, 93 mpg equivalent for electric operation and 37 mpg for gasoline operation. A simple average shows 65 mpg, which isn't particularly accurate but will do for this comparison.

That hybrid … Read more

The Nissan Leaf is, so far, leading the race in the electric-car space.

In June, Nissan sold 1,708 Leaf units in the U.S., easily overshadowing Chevrolet's Volt, which tallied 561 unit sales. In May, Nissan sold 1,142 Leaf units while Chevrolet sold 481 Volts.

Nissan's Leaf is a fully electric vehicle and is capable of driving for about 75 miles on a single charge. The Volt, by contrast, is a hybrid that lasts about 35 miles on a single electric charge before its gas engine kicks in.

Although the Volt is far behind in sales, … Read more