Replacing Nissan Leaf Battery to Cost Much Less Than Expected

Sep 27 2011

Despite rumours to the contrary, Nissan believes that replacing the battery pack in the Nissan Leaf electric car after five years will cost “hundreds, not thousands.”

The company says car owners will use their Leaf for an average of five years.  At that stage the battery will still have 80% of its useful life left.  The company bases its calculations on a motorist travelling 12,000 miles per year.

There is currently widespread debate in the industry about the viability of a used car market in the EV industry, with many people claiming that current technology makes this unlikely.

The CVP of global marketing communications over at Nissan, Simon Sproute, said “There’s been a lot of chatter online about tens of thousands of dollars or euros to replace a whole battery pack, but really you want to focus on the modules and these will be in the hundreds, not the thousands.”

He added that it was very unlikely that the whole battery pack would ever have to be replaced.

When discussing the lack of charging infrastructure, Sprout called it a “classic chicken and egg scenario.”  Nissan and other EV manufacturers first had to release suitable products that would gain mass public acceptance before an infrastructure to cater for recharging would become economically viable.

A number of governments have already announced incentives to stimulate electric vehicle purchases.  We would suggest that the car finance industry also come up with specialised products to make it easier for motorists to acquire electric cars.
 

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