The LEAF seems to have pretty decent trunk space (although that’s partly because you don’t have a spare tire), so I thought I’d put it to the test. What types of things will fit in a LEAF? Here are a few…
Will a 6' long carpet roll fit in the LEAF?
It does!
Plenty of room to spare
How about a bike?
It fits!
The hatchback closes, even with the front wheel still on the bike
This could be iffy...
It does!
It fits, but will it close?
As electric vehicles are entering the mainstream vehicle market, it’s understandable to be concerned about their safety. This topic has been in the news lately, especially regarding the safety of the lithium-ion batteries in the vehicles. I’m not a vehicle safety expert, but here is some information I found about electric vehicle safety.
The Nissan LEAF and the Chevrolet Volt have been tested for impact safety. Both vehicles are required to meet regulatory standards – the same standards that gasoline powered vehicles are held to. The 2011 LEAF and Volt both earned a Top Safety Pick rating from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, as well as a 5-star overall vehicle rating for safety as part of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s (NHSTA) New Car Assessment Program [1].
That being said, you may have heard about Chevrolet Volt battery fires that occurred in May 2011 and again in November 2011 after undergoing additional NHTSA testing. Federal safety regulators are currently investigating these fires. The May 2011 fire occurred three weeks after the NHTSA testing took place. The November 2011 fire occurred one week after a test designed to replicate the May 2011 testing. In both cases, the NHTSA did not follow battery disconnect and drainage procedures developed by GM engineers for handling the Volt after an accident [2,3]. In testing of a standard gasoline vehicle, the gasoline tank is typically drained after completion of the tests. The NHSTA has said that no fires have been reported in Volts that were involved in roadway accidents. They also said that safety testing has not raised concerns about other electric vehicles on the market [4].
In addition to the NHTSA tests, you may have also heard about a residential fire in a Mooresville, NC garage that occurred in early November. The homeowner had a Volt plugged into a Level 2 charging station in the garage. The investigation of this fire is ongoing, but the fire marshal stated a preliminary conclusion that the fire seems to have started outside the area of the vehicles [5].
I’ve found a few good articles addressing EV safety. They acknowledge potential hazards but discuss the many safety features addressing those hazards, pointing out there are not necessarily any more hazards in electric vehicles than in gasoline or diesel powered vehicles.
This article specifically addresses the May 2011 NHTSA Chevy Volt fire.
http://www.fireengineering.com/articles/2011/11/chevy-volt-response.html
This article addresses the question of “Will I get electrocuted if I drive an electric car through a puddle?” and has some good information about the safety of the battery and electrical systems.
http://auto.howstuffworks.com/fuel-efficiency/vehicles/electric-car-shock.htm
Sources:
[1]www.nissanusa.com and www.gm-volt.com
[2]http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-11-11/gm-volt-battery-fire-is-said-to-prompt-u-s-probe-into-electric-car-safety.html
[3]http://ecocentric.blogs.time.com/2011/11/29/are-electric-cars-safe/#ixzz1f5gIf5hS
[4]http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/26/chevy-volt-battery-fire-electric-car-general-motors_n_1114193.html
[5]http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1068564_fire-marshal-says-nc-garage-fire-started-away-from-chevy-volt-exclusive
It’s been awhile since we talked LEAF features, so here are my thoughts on another one – the onboard navigation. This is another one of those things you can find in standard gasoline vehicles, but again, not one I have in my own personal vehicle so it’s kind of a novelty for me. In addition to the standard navigation aspect, the LEAF’s system also tells you the location of nearby charging stations and directs you to them. I haven’t actually had a need to use this feature yet because there aren’t a lot of public stations around where I typically drive, but I could see it being handy as more stations start popping up.
There are some things I find annoying about the navigation, though. For instance, the maps were already out of date when I picked the car up from the dealership. I can forgive it for not knowing the brand new road changes, but there are some changes that took affect over a year ago that aren’t correct on the map. It seems like you should get free map updates for as long as you have a Carwings subscription, but I haven’t heard anything about that. Also, for safety reasons, some of the navigation features are disabled while you’re driving. I definitely understand why they do that, but what’s odd is, only some of the navigation is disabled. They haven’t actually made it so you can’t enter any navigation info while you’re driving, they’ve just disabled what I think is the simplest way to enter it. If you dig around in the menus, you can still enter a destination while you’re moving. [Note: A passenger of mine discovered this while I was driving. I wasn't endangering everyone around us by looking through the menus while I was driving! Well, at least not that time. (just kidding!)] To me, that seems almost more dangerous. Why disable the easiest way to input a destination? Why not just disable everything? I’m surely not the only one who will look for ways around the safety features…right?
Last Friday I took AE’s LEAF over to the NC Office of State Fire Marshal so they could take some pictures of the LEAF for the Emergency Response Guides they are developing for various hybrid and electric vehicles. These guides are so important for protecting the safety of first responders in the event of an accident. They showed me some stuff about the LEAF that I didn’t know, like the location of the main battery cutoff switch and what needs to be disconnected to completely de-energize the car. Here’s a link to some of the guides they’ve developed so far. Great work guys!
I’ve been out with AE’s LEAF to several local outreach events lately and have been getting a question that I don’t know the answer to. Quite a few people have asked me about insuring the LEAF. Does it cost more to insure it? Are there any special considerations you don’t have with insuring a gasoline vehicle? So, I did some digging. The insurance companies I spoke with said there is no difference between insuring a hybrid or electric vehicle and insuring a similar gasoline powered vehicle – the cost would be the same. Interestingly, one company I spoke with told me they have a “hybrid clause” in their policy. The hybrid clause says that if you total your standard gasoline vehicle, the insurance company will pay up to $2,500 over the replacement value of your gasoline vehicle if you lease or purchase a hybrid or electric vehicle as a replacement. So if you happen to total your car (let’s hope not!) you might want to check with your insurance company to see if they have a hybrid clause!
I took AE’s LEAF to the NC Sustainable Energy Association’s Making Energy Work Conference, held at the Raleigh Convention Center on Wednesday, November 9. It was a great conference with excellent speakers and presentations. I talked to a bunch of people who were very interested in the LEAF and the other PEVs on display. They had some good questions about the vehicles and I think a few are even considering getting one for themselves! Overall, a great event. Nice job, NCSEA!
AE’s LEAF at NCSEA’s Making Energy Work Conference
Like many hybrid vehicles do, the LEAF gives you feedback on how economically you’re driving. It does this via an “Eco Indicator” on the dashboard display. The Eco indicator is affected by things like:
The Eco Indicator
(I made a tree!)
There are two indications of how economically you’re driving: an instantaneous indicator and a long term indicator. The instantaneous indicator has bars that increase and decrease as you drive along. The long term indicator is represented by a large tree symbol – your Eco Tree. Tree segments are created as you drive more economically. Once you’ve completed a tree, a smaller tree appears next to the larger tree and a new tree begins to build. The more economically you drive, the more trees you create.
Now, I admit I don’t always drive the LEAF as economically as I could, but it is fun to try and bank as many trees as you can on a trip. The best I’ve done so far on my way to or from work is 1.6 trees. On longer trips, I’ve banked four trees!
You can also look at your Eco Tree record through the Carwings system. There you can see your recent tree history and the total number of trees you’ve created. There is also a display showing the “World Eco Forest”, which shows the total number of Eco Trees created by all LEAFs worldwide and the CO2 tailpipe emission reduction resulting from those trees. I have no idea how Nissan calculates this, so who knows if it’s an accurate number.
My recent tree history
The World Eco Forest!
There’s an interesting article that came out last week discussing Nissan’s apparent position that there is “no market need” for a long range electric vehicle. The article says Nissan’s research has found that the average number of miles LEAF owners are driving per day is only 37 miles, and the average single trip distance is only 7 miles. So do we need a long range electric vehicle? I’m not sure. For most of the driving I do on a day-to-day basis, the LEAF meets my needs. But, it’s hard to get out of the mindset that your primary vehicle should be able to take you wherever you want or need to go. You could have a gasoline vehicle as your “second car” for long trips, or even rent a gasoline vehicle when you need to go farther, but in my experience with talking to people at electric transportation education and outreach events, this doesn’t seem to be a solution that many are comfortable with. So it’s interesting to me that Nissan would say there is no market need for a long range EV when, in my opinion, that’s not what the market is saying. At least not yet.
Here’s a link to the full article:
Yesterday morning I had a new experience with the LEAF. I was a few minutes into my morning commute and the LEAF dinged at me. I looked down at the dashboard display and there was a picture of a snowflake labeled “Low Outside Temperature.” I was pretty puzzled by this. What exactly is the purpose of this warning? Just in case you hadn’t noticed, it’s cold outside?
Further research (aka reading the manual) revealed that this indicator warns you when the outside air temperature is below 37oF. The manual didn’t explain why they feel they need to warn you about this.
Today was a chilly morning in N.C. and I was interested to see how using the heat in the LEAF would affect its range. When I got in the car, it was 43oF outside and the range estimate was at 70 miles. I bumped the heat up and the LEAF’s energy display said using the climate control was costing me 7 miles of range. I drove the LEAF 15.5 miles in ECO mode and when I arrived at my destination, the range estimate was at 37 miles – a drop of 33 miles. With a 15.5 mile trip and the 7 mile hit the energy display said the climate control was costing me, I should have been at 47.5 miles. I was driving on the highway for most of my trip, so maybe that contributed to the range discrepancy. Or, perhaps the climate control hit is worse than the car says it is.
