Nissan Leaf sales slump, and Volt future

[RexKI]

Don't forget where the electricity comes from in Hawaii!!

Petroleum-fired power plants supply more than three-fourths of Hawaii’s electricity generation. from http://205.254.135.7/state/state-ene...les.cfm?sid=HI

Unless you have a SunCatcher Solar concentrating Sterling Engine solar to electric generator dish, then you would be better off just burning the fuel that goes into HI's generators directly into a four wheel vehicle with an otto-cycle ICE. Without current government subsidies on Petroleum, HI electricity could easily skyrocket up to 75-100 cents per kWh. Remember the generators are at best 35-40% efficient at the electric side, coupled with transmission loss of another 7-10% and distribution loss of another 5-10%, Hawaiians are only getting at best 40% out of the diesel fuel and oil shipments.

[AySz88]

Don't forget where the electricity comes from in Hawaii!!

Petroleum-fired power plants supply more than three-fourths of Hawaii’s electricity generation. from http://205.254.135.7/state/state-ene...les.cfm?sid=HI

Unless you have a SunCatcher Solar concentrating Sterling Engine solar to electric generator dish, then you would be better off just burning the fuel that goes into HI's generators directly into a four wheel vehicle with an otto-cycle ICE. Without current government subsidies on Petroleum, HI electricity could easily skyrocket up to 75-100 cents per kWh. Remember the generators are at best 35-40% efficient at the electric side, coupled with transmission loss of another 7-10% and distribution loss of another 5-10%, Hawaiians are only getting at best 40% out of the diesel fuel and oil shipments.

Note that even with all those losses (if your numbers are accurate), 40% of ~95 MPGe is still 38 MPG, which isn't bad. And it can always get cleaner if power generation is cleaned up.

[mikeg3]

I think that Leaf sales figures will implode unless Nissan deals well with the Arizona early adopters. Those air-cooled batteries will get quite a thermal workout this Summer and the original drivers understand the range they were getting so they'll know the difference.

Nissan can replace the batteries without reference to the "warranty", under-price the replacement batteries, or become a a Fox News feature story.

If they pick door 3, I hope the Volt doesn't get caught in the fallout.

[stuart22]

Nissan can replace the batteries without reference to the "warranty", under-price the replacement batteries, or become a a Fox News feature story.

If they pick door 3, I hope the Volt doesn't get caught in the fallout.

Good point. GM might consider innoculating the Volt by always referring to its battery as a 'thermically protected battery' in the media and advertising.

[jbfalaska]

Every car maker, hopefully will succeed - ALL of them.

In America, we export one thing better than anything else, and that's American dollars for foreign oil. $400,000,000,000 last year alone. And America's role is to patrol the middle east oil lanes for oil barons who despise our freedom of religion, women's rights, democracy, personal liberty. I served along with my wonderful wife for 20 years each. The cost of patrolling the world's oil supply? Another $400 billion. So who wins? Our competitors. Every dollar we spend on military might and long wars is added to the cost of our goods and services that must compete with other nations who pony up NOTHING to the cost. At great disadvantage, we are spending our fortunes away on oil. That is why I bought a volt and joined this site years ago. I pray for Elon Musk at the Tesla group as the true father of making mass production of the electric cars AND insisting on built in USA an inevitable move for America. May our addiction end sooner than later. May another $2 trillion in war costs then added to our costs to compete for shelf space go away forever.

[DonC]

In America, we export one thing better than anything else, and that's American dollars for foreign oil. $400,000,000,000 last year alone.

Amen. But it's not foreign oil. It's just oil. Fact is, oil is too expensive. At $100/bbl you have an economy that, well, looks like the economy we have. If oil was $50 you could add another point or two to GDP and things would be very different.

The problem with domestic oil is that domestic producers can't deliver $50/bbl oil. In order to get decent economic growth we need a cheaper source of energy than oil.