Nissan launches LEAF “taxi” campaign in London

A fleet of zero-emission Nissan LEAFs will be driving around London on the 23^rd and 24^th June, offering free taxi rides. To grab a ride, all a prospective passenger has to do is send a Tweet that incorporates the hashtag “#6XCHEAPER” and their chosen destination. Nissan is also using the activity to gather consumer feedback on a potential taxi of the future.

The use of Twitter is an integral part of Nissan’s ambitious campaign, “The Big Turn On”, which is spreading the EV message via social media channels.
The #6XCHEAPER tag emphasizes that fueling an electric vehicle is six times cheaper in the UK than a similar sized gasoline car. Using off-peak electricity, Nissan estimates it costs just 1.75 pence in fuel to travel one mile in a Nissan LEAF, but more than 10 pence per mile in a conventional car. (Calculations are based on a national average of British Gas Economy 7 rates as at 12 January 2012, assuming 7 hours of charging overnight at the night rate and 1 hour in the daytime charged at the Tier-2 daytime rate. A 109 mile charge range, 95% charging efficiency.

A trip from central London to Heathrow Airport, for example, would cost the Nissan LEAF driver a mere 28 pence in electricity whereas the driver of a gasoline-powered car would be forking out £1.68 in fuel. A trip to Oxford—at approximately 60 miles, within the car’s range—would cost the Nissan LEAF driver less than £1 in fuel, but would cost the driver of a conventional car almost £6.

Because it produces zero emissions, Nissan LEAF is exempt from London’s congestion charge and attracts no annual vehicle excise duty.
The fleet of Nissan LEAF EVs will be based at their very own “taxi rank'” at the Truman Brewery, near Liverpool St Station and will be giving free rides to destinations across London—as far west as Turnham Green or to the O2 Arena in the east. The Nissan LEAF cabs will go south of the river as far as Clapham and as far north as Hampstead. They will be operating from 10am to 6pm on both Saturday and Sunday and driven by professional drivers from car service operator, Climate Cars.

All Tweets sent with the ‘#6XCHEAPER' hashtag will be monitored and winners of the free rides chosen at random to avoid queues. Each journey will be logged and passengers shown just how much they would save in fuel costs by going electric.

Rocky Mountain Power begins VIA Motors truck test

In Utah, the state’s largest utility provider, Rocky Mountain Power is embarking on a new truck test. It has acquired two of the GM-based extended-range electric pickups from VIA motors, using the vehicles to determine if they will save enough in fuel costs and prove durable enough and help the company’s bottom line. If the test proves successful it could pave the way for a full-scale fleet order.

Orem-based VIA Motors officially introduced its line of extended-range pickups vans and SUVs back at the North American International Auto Show in January. And with Bob Lutz appointed to its board of directors, VIA has essentially the ideal spokesman for promoting its eREV vehicles.



Using a 650-volt drive system specifically engineered for full-size pickups, the eREV GM-based trucks are capable of traveling a distance of 30-40 miles on electric power alone and up to 400 miles using the on-board gasoline generator to replenish the vehicle’s “non flammable” lithium-ion battery pack. According to information released by VIA Motors, this enables fuel economy figures of up to 100 miles per gallon. As for charging, the truck can have the battery replenished in four hours using a 240-volt outlet, 11 with a standard 120-volt household unit.

“We’re excited to take this truck on an extended test drive,” said Rocky Mountain Power’s President and CEO Richard Walje.

Walje says the utility company plans to press the eREV pickups into regular fleet use, which will include “loading them up with lots of equipment, towing things with them and validating how they will actually work as a replacement for the fleet we have.”
Although it’s far too early to tell how effective the pickups will prove in service, it’s going to be interesting to see how they perform.




VIA Motors’ President Alan Perriton, believes that electric fleet vehicles could, down the road, not only help utilities save on fuel costs and reduce emissions but also perform other functions, such as supplying power to neighborhoods, while crews work to fix power outages, “a sort of traveling power station, he said.”

Back in January at NAIAS, VIA Motors said it planned to begin manufacturing the trucks in 2012, with actual fleet deliveries scheduled to commence sometime in 2013. Given this week’s announcement, there’s every indication the company is on track to make good on those projections.


Source: GM-Volt.com

Chevy Volt actually underpriced given current lease payments, residual estimate

Here's another way to think about the Chevrolet Volt extended-range plug-in hybrid: as a raging good deal.

Writing at the Motley Fool, Chris Baines says the Volt just might be underpriced because its monthly lease payments, through Ally Financial, are quite competitive to those for a Toyota Camry. More importantly, Baines says, Volt lessees may be able to make a profit off the car after the lease period expires.

Volt drivers can lease the car through Ally Financial at rates starting at $369 a month. Comparatively, Toyota is charging $289 a month to lease the Camry, whose base price is "a little over half" the Volt's base price, according to the Fool. The trick comes in what Baines sees as an incorrect residual value that Ally is estimating for the Volt, writing:

If the value of the car at the end of the lease deviates significantly from the agreed upon residual value at the beginning of the lease, you can win big. The one big difference is that you're contractually obligated to exercise one of these two options with a lease, whereas with stock options you aren't obligated to exercise either.
And in the case of the Volt, the potential for the price to differ from the agreed upon residual value is huge. [...]
Yes, this is speculating and not investing. But the point is that with the Toyota Camry you don't even have the possibility of making money. With the Volt you do. [...]
If Ally has set the residual value too high (as I suspect) then the lease payments may be too low. By contrast, if they've set the residual too low then lessees will opt to buy the cars for less than Ally could have resold them for.

Perhaps others are seeing the Volt this way, too. Chevy parent General Motors earlier this month said May sales of the Volt totaled 1,680 units, more than three times year-earlier figures. Through the first five months of the year, GM sold 7,057 Volts, or about 600 less than the automaker sold for all of 2011.



Source: Autoblog Green