Nissan Electric Car

Later this year, Nissan will be launching the Nissan LEAF electric car. The LEAF is a spacious five door, five seat family hatchback powered entirely by electricity. The top speed is electronically limited to around 85mph and the car has a claimed range of 100 miles.

Nissan have high hopes for this car. It is their only offering in the hugely competitive 'C-segment' part of the car market, competing with the likes of the Ford Focus, the Opel/Vauxhall Astra and the VW Golf. It says a lot for Nissan's confidence in the LEAF that it is only going to be available as an electric car.

In March 2010, Nissan took the LEAF on a tour of the United States, showing the car to prospective customers. They opened the order books in April and asked customers for a deposit, they took 8,000 orders for the car in just a few days. Before the car is made available, Nissan are confidentally expecting 25,000 customer orders in the US.

At the end of April, the LEAF tour came to the United Kingdom and the first prospective customers got to see the LEAF for the first time.

During these tours, it was not possible for anyone to try out a LEAF - the general public wasn't even allowed to sit inside one. A very few individuals were allowed to get up closer to the vehicle, sit inside and press a few buttons. My colleague Nikki Gordon-Bloomfield was even allowed to have a very short ride inside the real car: something that even the journalists were not allowed to do.

The LEAF itself is very spacious and practical. Compared to other vehicles of a similar size, there is more space for driver and passengers than many of its rivals and luggage space is also impressive. Much of this is due to the packaging: there is no big engine or gearbox taking up space - instead there is a compact electric motor and the batteries are evenly distributed underneath the floor.

Nissan have designed it to have a very high tech feel, with a digital dashboard and a sleek, polished finish. I was concerned that this could be a problem: Toyota have tried to do something similar with the Prius, and the result is a confusing dashboard with too many controls. With the LEAF, however, everything appeared to be thoughtfully laid out and designed to be easy to use.

Whilst it was not possible to have a full test drive of the LEAF at this time, there was a car available for prospective customers to have a ride in. Unlike many, I was lucky enough to actually drive it myself. The Nissan EV-12 is a development vehicle with the drivetrain and the mechanicals of the Nissan LEAF, which has been used to develop the technology.

I drove the EV-12 for a short test run at the O2 Arena in London. Whilst it was not possible to carry out a full evaluation on the car, first impressions are that Nissan have done a very good job. The car was very impressive with solid handling, an ultra-smooth drive and excellent performance. If the real Nissan LEAF matches the EV-12, it will be a very good car indeed. Watch the video below to see the drive:

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