Nissan Leaf sales down despite availability of new 30kW battery

[electracity]

If people start demanding EVs due to some kind of panic situation

The "panic" would not come in the form of people demanding EV, but government policy. Even a stable carbon tax would shift investment further to batteries.

I don't agree that the primary problem is the ability to make enough batteries. The problem for EV makers is buying enough batteries without raising the price. A large order from Tesla in the early days was not realistically financeable, because Tesla was risky. A very large order from Toyota to Panasonic is financeable, and Panasonic would build the capacity.

Apple can order and receive vast quantities of batteries. They can place and receive 100gWh in three months, but they can in three years.

Tesla still isn't in the position to order 100gWh, which is why they had to do the gigafactory.

 

[wdolson]

Li-ion batteries are difficult to make and require special equipment. It takes time and investment to expand production and a battery maker isn't going to invest in the extra factory space for one big order without promise of further orders. People have analyzed LG Chem's battery making capacity and determined the max production for the Bolt is around 54,000 a year with their current capacity. If GM wanted to build 1 million Bolts a year, it would take billions sunk into new factory facilities and would take around 3 years to build.

The reason Tesla built the Gigafactory was not because Tesla wasn't in the position to order 100 GWh of batteries, they don't need that many batteries right now. They don't have the money either, but they also don't have the money to buy Ford class aircraft carriers. They need neither so it's moot.

The reason the GF got built was Elon was looking around at how to make batteries as cheap as possible and came up with a few factors that could save about 30% on cost:
1) Make the batteries as close as possible to the final assembly plant
2) The way batteries are made today, the components travel all over Asia with different steps being done in different places. Do all those things in one place cuts out all the travel time and expense.
3) If Panasonic makes a battery Tesla optimized for EVs that is a little larger, it makes assembly of the battery pack cheaper (fewer cells).
4) Batteries were the bottleneck to expanding production and no battery maker was stepping up to provide for the kind of demand Tesla was going to put on the supply chain for the Model 3.

Elon has said all these things multiple times when discussing the reasons for the GF.

Tesla could have contracted with Panasonic to build batteries in Japan in either existing or new plants, but they would still be made the old inefficient way and would still need to travel from Japan before getting installed. If they were made the way batteries are made now in Asia, Tesla would not see the cost savings they need to see to make the Model 3 happen.

Tesla is currently the biggest buyer of Li-ion batteries in the world. Panasonic has about 40% of world production and almost all their production goes to Tesla. If Tesla comes knocking on any battery maker's door, they will bend over backwards to do business with them.

Tesla made a deal with LG Chem for batteries for the Roadster upgrade program last years and there are questions swirling about because Tesla recently bought about 1.7 million battery cells from Samsung. The batteries they bought were lower WH rating than the ones they use in the Model S and X and 1.7 million is only enough for about 250 Model S/X so it's for some other project, maybe something Tesla Energy is doing.

1.7 million would be a good sized order for an electronics company. If a laptop has 18 cells, that's enough for 100,000 devices. For something like a camcorder, it would be at least 500,000. For an electronics company the size of Tesla, that could easily be a year's production. It's a drop in the bucket for Apple or Sony, but they are the giants of the industry. 1.7 million is about 2 day's production for Tesla.

 

[tftf]

Misleading view, looking at US-only sales. See worldwide sales here:

So far this year the Nissan LEAF (thanks to a new 30 kWh version) is safely in the #1 spot with some 19,500 deliveries.

BYD, Nissan And Tesla Lead Worldwide EV Sales In First Four Months Of 2016

And let's not forget this is most likely the last minor revision to this 2009-2010 car. A new LEAF design will be announced in 2017-2018.

 

[electracity]

So far this year the Nissan LEAF (thanks to a new 30 kWh version) is safely in the #1 spot with some 19,500 deliveries.

Leaf leads in unit sales. Tesla leads in sales by a large margin.

 

[ZachShahan]

Thanks for sharing. The best part of that chart for me was seeing Roadster in the list.

Haha. It was a big survey. Ramping up to do the 2nd annual one fairly soon. Be sure to chime in

 

[ZachShahan]

How's Julian?!? Hope he's OK and doing well. Give him by best wishes and tell him I'm hoping he's allowed to return here to the forum, but that he needs to play his cards better, smarter i.e. with more humbleness, real or imitated (doesn't matter, humbleness imitated to such a level that it's unrecognizable from real humbleness is real humbleness).

Ha, he seems to be doing well. Just had a daughter and seems to be in love with her. Also has A LOT in the works, which I imagine will be public before too long.

You can catch a bit of him here: Automaker Response To Tesla Model 3, Plug-In Hybrids, & BYD (Cleantech Revolution Tour Highlights)

And his main presentation should be published on CleanTechnica soon (~1 hour video), along with others.

I haven't followed the investor discussions much lately. He got banned again? Why?

 

[Johan]

Give him my best and say congratulations on having a daughter.

Yes it does seem he was either banned or left in protest. I believe it was all proceeded by others questioning whether his track record of predicting stock movements were in fact as precise as he himself claimed. I suppose it got a bit heated.

 

[ReddyLeaf]

Leaf leads in unit sales. Tesla leads in sales by a large margin.

Well, here's a strange twist on things. Nissan is turning a bunch of those degrading batteries into grid storage. I wonder if that was a "smart" decision early on by the corporate folks. They must have known that the batteries would degrade, need to be replaced, and be available for 2nd life. This has been in the news for several years, but now we're starting to see a large number of battery replacements. So, doing some estimates, roughly 85,000 Leafs sold in the US, assuming all degrade and are replaced, that represents nearly 1.5 GWh, worldwide even more. In a couple of years, the numbers might approach 5 GWh. Contrast this to Tesla, whose batteries don't degrade as quickly due to thermal control, different chemistry, fewer charge/discharge cycles, etc. All in all, there will be GWh's of Leaf batteries available, while the Tesla batteries will last 10+ yrs. Hence, Tesla needs to use "new" batteries in their PowerWall, while Nissan simply uses the degraded ones. Was that the plan all along? Probably not, but it makes for a ironic story!
Nissan, Green Charge Networks Turn ‘Second-Life’ EV Batteries Into Grid Storage Business

 

[ZachShahan]

Give him my best and say congratulations on having a daughter.

Yes it does seem he was either banned or left in protest. I believe it was all proceeded by others questioning whether his track record of predicting stock movements were in fact as precise as he himself claimed. I suppose it got a bit heated.

I think he just got busy from presenting at our conference in Berlin and then stuff that got rolling from that. But could very well have been either of those things too! I noticed that habit ... but didn't know about the discussions.

 

[Cosmacelf]

To echo wdolson's excellent long post about how any why the gigafactory will be able to reduce battery costs: it isn't only batteries.

People (and companies, witness GM's investments in speculative battery ventures), have a tendency to focus on one or a couple of breakthrough innovations to reduce costs. "Gosh, if we could get that silicon anode out of the lab where those eggheads have been fiddling with it for years, we'd be able to build cheap EVs", the conventional thinking goes.

Elon has never thought that way. In the very early days of SpaceX, he realized he could build rockets cheaper than anyone else. How? By optimizing pretty much everything about how rockets are made. It wasn't one innovation, it was on the order of a 100 different optimizations that added up to being able to build by far the cheapest rocket.

Same thing with Model S. You know the real reason why GM, Nissan, Mercedes, BMW and others haven't come out with a true model S competitor? Because if they were to exactly replicate the specs, their car would sell for $150K, not $75K.

Until and unless the car companies start taking a systematic approach to cost reduction for their batteries, and overall car design (Model S has a very low drag coefficient for a reason, not just to look cool), Tesla will continue to be the market leader.

Incidentally, don't discount the importance of the Supercharger network as another reason for Tesla sales dominance.

 

[WannabeOwner]

Model S has a very low drag coefficient for a reason, not just to look cool

It has made me think "Wouldn't that work for a ICE too?" - if a Model-S like design would improve ICE MPG (significantly?) why aren't all recently launched models shaped like that?

I expect the answer is obvious, but it alludes me!

 

[Cosmacelf]

It has made me think "Wouldn't that work for a ICE too?" - if a Model-S like design would improve ICE MPG (significantly?) why aren't all recently launched models shaped like that?

I expect the answer is obvious, but it alludes me!

Because ICE engines are so much more inefficient at using energy than electric motors. Only about 33% of the energy consumed (gasoline) is converted to useful work in an ICE engine, whereas an electric motor manages about 90% efficiency. So ICE manufacturers get a bigger bang for the buck by incrementally improving ICE engine performance rather than reducing wind effects.

Also, ICE cars can easily overcome bad fuel consumption just by adding a bigger gas tank, which is a small penalty in terms of design. Batteries take up more space for the same power output.

And finally, not everyone likes the low slung Model S - it isn't practical for those that have a hard time getting into and out of cars. All else being equal, most of the population prefers higher comfort cars.

Flipped another way, the reason Model S went to such lengths to have a low drag coefficient was to increase range. In an EV, range is the single most important constraint and it is hard to meet since batteries take up a lot of space, are heavy, and cost a lot. Range is not an issue with ICE cars.

 

[wdolson]

It has made me think "Wouldn't that work for a ICE too?" - if a Model-S like design would improve ICE MPG (significantly?) why aren't all recently launched models shaped like that?

I expect the answer is obvious, but it alludes me!

What @Cosmacelf said, but I'll add a bit.

As speed increases, drag also increases, but ICEs are able to offset this drag effect by gearing the engine so it's working at it's most efficient at around 60-70 mph. Aerodynamic drag begins to become a factor around 25-40 mph. That's the speed range where you're overcoming all the static friction in the system, and aerodynamic drag hasn't become as significant yet.

Because they gear ICE cars to have peak engine efficiency around 60-70, the overall efficiency curve is usually fairly flat from about 30-40 to 60-70. Aerodynamic drag increases, but it's offset by the increase in efficiency from the motor. Over that speed and the efficiency drops as well as aero drag builds up, so the efficiency curve can fall off quite sharply.

ICE motors have an RPM where they are most efficient. Hybrids take advantage of that, running the motor as it's most efficient most of the time to maximize mileage. Electric motors aren't efficient at extremely low speeds because of friction and if you get them going really fast I believe the efficiency drops, but their efficiency is very consistent through a very wide range, easily wide enough for use in an electric car. That's why electric cars don't need transmissions, you may get a little better torque in a higher gear, but the trade off essentially isn't worth it most of the time.

As Comacelf said, ICE engines are very inefficient, though even 33% is probably a bit high for most engines. Electric motors are 80-90% efficient and don't really have a sweet spot RPM like ICEs do. Gasoline has 33 KWh/gal, it's a fantastically dense energy source, and batteries only have about 1 KWh/gal (of volume). EVs make up for this difference by being extremely efficient and an EV that is intended for the highway needs to be as aerodynamic as possible to maximize that efficiency.

ICE companies can and do improve mileage by making cars more aerodynamic. The Model S is shaped like a lot of modern sedans, but where aerodynamics can make a big difference in EV efficiency, it makes a much smaller impact on ICE efficiency.

 

[YBT]

Can we change the title to "Nissan Leaf sales down due to availability of 30kW battery"?

People were expecting Nissan to upsize the pack with a lot more aggression but instead they've taken the usual "inch at a time" ICE approach and scared away plenty of potential buyers who are appraising the EV landscape for what it will be like around the 2017/2018 mark - the EVgeddon if you will

For the sake of Nissan's EV aspirations the Leaf 2.0 had best be announced soon (and loudly) and planned to land within the next 18 - 24 months. For this car to make sense in the market to come as the cheaper and slightly less capable alternative to the TM3 & Bolt 150 - 160 miles of EPA range is O.K if the price starts around 25 - 30K before incentives. To my eyes the design is also in desperate need of an overhaul... the abundance of soft lines excludes many male buyers. Some more solidity and less curvature could make a perfectly gender agnostic hatch like what Volkswagen has with the Golf.

 

[gene]

Testimony from a Nissan engineer of 200 miles range.

Nissan finally admits that a 200-plus mile Leaf electric vehicle is coming. We've been waiting for this.

 

[ValueAnalyst]

I have another thread where I post this, but since you specifically asked, here are some Model 3 ICE competitors sales figures:

Do you still keep track of this?

 

[RubberToe]

Do you still keep track of this?

You betcha...

Model 3 reveal effect on other luxury car sales

 

[jerry33]

It has made me think "Wouldn't that work for a ICE too?" - if a Model-S like design would improve ICE MPG (significantly?) why aren't all recently launched models shaped like that?

I expect the answer is obvious, but it alludes me!

The reason that it will be less effective in an ICE is because of the poor airflow underneath. Tailpipes, mufflers, etc. create a large amount of aerodynamic resistance.