Nissan is not a member of The lobbying group(The AAM)so they are free to go a different way. It appears that the AAM plan is to have their alliance members(Toyota, GM, Ford, Fiat, BMW, etc.) slowly migrate to BEVs by building efficient ICEs, HEVs and then PHEVs. By slowing down the migration, these companies can maximize profits.

Nissan/Renault's CEO is willing to take a chance by leaping over the competition. And, they have a worldwide ready market by signing up with charging spot companies like "Better Place." Well Done Nissan! If the price is within reason, sign me up. I'm tired of smoke and fumes, expensive fuel and auto repairs.

Even with initiatives like this, the US is unlikely to be an area where EV's reach a relatively high market penetration soon.
Compare it, say, with London in England.
Gas costs around $6.50 US gallon, you have to pay a £5daily congestion charge which is waived for EV's, 220volts is standard making for fast charging, average distances driven are relatively low and the climate is not extreme so you don't use so much of the power on air con, or suffer poor battery performance in cold weather.
France, with surpluses of cheap nuclear power at night may be in an even stronger position.
Nissan has said that it hopes to sell the car at a comparable price to ICE cars, and lease the battery at a low enough rate so that it works out with the electricity cheaper than buying the petrol.
You could hit those targets in London and still charge a profitable £2k annually for the battery.
The factories in the UK and Portugal should have no problem selling their 120,000 output, getting some serious volume and enabling cost reductions.
The far east should do equally well.
I doubt that volume sales in the US will do nearly as well.

Yes DM, there is nothing like a good squeeze on the pocketbook to convince the hardcore (even TT) that low efficiency oversize ICE vehicles have to be replaced with more efficient, lighter electrified units.

TT, you are certainly aware that Nissan-Renault is about the only major who is commited to BEVs mass production (including batteries) but you seem to have elected to ignore it so that you dont have to go thru an attitude change.

There is a progressive improvement in e-storage units performance. Cost will go down even faster when mass produced in many countries. Sometime between 2015 and 2020 e-storage units energy density could reach 500+ Wh/Kg and cost as little as $100 to $200/KWh. A 50 Kwh unit would not weight more than 100 Kg (less than one USA passenger) and cost around $7500 and under $5K in China or India.

Larger BEVs for the USA market will require 100+ KWh storage units and will cost more than the rest of the world. Its a question of weight to cost ratio + our acquired crave for oversized vehicles.

We dont have to worry much about the extra electricity required. A recent study concluded that in a highly electrified nation, replacing 25% of their ICE vehicles with BEVs or PHEVs would only increase total e-energy consumption by 2%. With night time charging, it would not even be noticed.

Our large Hydro Co. has offered to foot the bill (up to $3B) to electrify 300+ Km of suburban train rails. The initial electrification cost would be recuperated over 20-25 years via the sale of electricity at a slightly higher rate but still much cheaper than current and future cost for diesel. There are no loosers. The passengers, operators, people living close to the rail lines, Hydro, local and provincial economies etc all win. Electrification is rarely or never negative.

"Oops GM people are now little green men."

It ain't called the "green" machine for nothin'

Rumors are that the Nissan Leaf BEV will be priced half way between a well equipped Sentra and Altima or about $24K to $26K USD.

Almost 50% of the total price is for the battery pack.

Price will change when batteries price come down in 3 or 4 years.