Nissan Planning Electric Vehicle Charging Network

by Tim Joseph

In 1996 we started seeing a small, funny looking car driving around the highways of Detroit. It was the GM EV1, an electric vehicle that would only be made for 3 years. As part of the lease on the EV1 you had to install a charging station in your home. The driver would be able to travel about 55 to 75 miles between charges making the EV1 an excellent commuter vehicle.

There were so many great things to say about GM's first electric car but there were also some draw backs. You could not travel any further than your battery range and battery technology did not progress as quickly as General Motors had expected. After building 1,117 EV1's and leasing them in California, GM took the vehicles back and destroyed them. This was about the same time the Hybrids came along.

Nissan has an answer the problems GM ran in to a decade ago. Their new electric vehicle will go one sale in the United States in 2012 and will no doubt raise some eye brows. A 30 minute charge will provide the owner with 80% battery power, approximately 80 more miles.

Mark Perry, Nissan's director of product planning and strategy has said that "It will take three layers of charging: home chargers in the garage; workplace charging, including parking lots and garages in downtown business areas; and a public infrastructure built around the normal transportation areas, shopping malls, movie theaters, restaurants, and airports."

Nissan is also asking their dealers to install charging stations as a courtesy to customer who are passing through. This demonstrates Nissan's commitment to the Electric Vehicle program. Nissan's Electric Vehicle will be a 5 seater that uses next generation lithium ion batteries to delivery a range of 100 miles.