Nissan confirms a longer-range Leaf model will be joining the local lineup.
Good news! The Nissan Leaf will soon be available with a larger battery and longer driving range in Australia.
Confirming that it will sell the Leaf e+ already available in overseas markets, Nissan Australia will have a two-tier electric car range by mid-2021, offer the second-generation Leaf and Leaf e+.
“The e+ will be here in Australia in the first half of 2021,” a spokesperson told us.
The newer model has a larger 62kWh lithium-ion battery which eclipses the standard model’s 40kWh storage and generates a 115km longer range. In practice, according to the WLTP testing procedure, this sees a maximum range of 385km from the Leaf e+, an improvement on the Leaf’s 270km.
In our own long-term testing of the Leaf, we have found the 270km limit to be easily workable for most urban duties, though the longer range will reduce range anxiety and is much more flexible.
The battery remains passively cooled and uses the same Type 2 plus Chademo charging interfaces as the Leaf, though the Leaf e+ is capable of faster charging, accepting 100kW peak charging over the Leaf’s 50kW cap. This means the Leaf e+ can charge a longer range in a shorter time, though reaching maximum charge for the battery at 100kW takes about the same one-hour as the Leaf at 50kW.
Further improvements come with a 50kW performance bump to 160kW, which offsets the Leaf e+’s heavier battery. Torque also heads north by 20Nm to 340Nm total.
Visually, the Leaf e+ looks mostly the same, though the boot is reduced slightly to accommodate the large battery.
With the battery being the most expensive component of an electric vehicle pricing is hard to gauge. Currently, the standard Leaf is priced at $49,990 plus on-roads, so the e+ might crack $60k.
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Too late too inefficient too expensive and Chinese threat fm MG version also.
If you aren’t genuinely enthusiastic why bother forcing them on your dealerships ?
Not many average motorists are prepared to pay even twice the price for an EV version car, that’s a lot of petrol and servicing expenses before breaking even from lower charging battery cost.
If EV was genuinely equivalent to the same size ICEV including real range, recharging time for 100% (80% is always quoted because fully charging regularly is not recommended) and availability of recharging stations Australia wide I would definitely be prepared to buy one, but must be capable of long distance towing, so price and performance similar to an Isuzu MU-X. Or when I later in life change to a smaller car the same conditions to apply apart from towing.
I don’t see any environmental statement in EV in Australia where most electricity comes from power stations and other generators burning coal, gas or diesel.