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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
is anyone looking into the Nissan Leaf electric vehicle?
i'm so dorky-excited about it. i can't wait for them to come out with more info next month. depending on what the details are i might put myself on their waiting list.
Re: is anyone looking into the Nissan Leaf electric vehicle?
I am glad that you're excited and I'm not trying to rain on your parade, I'm just giving my two cents.
I dug into it a little bit, and while an electric vehicle is an awesome step in the right direction, the greeness of that step depends wholly on where your electricity comes from. Living in VA, by far the largest portion of our electricity comes from mountaintop strip coal mining. One of the most environmentally disaterous methods possible. Not only are you destroying a whole ecosystem to get the coal, it's also low grade and pollutes the air, water, and all the workers and towns who come into contact with it. And that's all here in the U.S., not overseas in the Middle East. I'm not advocating foreign oil, but the alternative electricity generation system (like wind or solar) has to be up and running first before we just switch all our cars to electric.
Good point.
I live in an area where we can choose 100% renewable energy (since we have wind power close by). So for me, it wouldnt be bad. Not that I am in the market for a new car....
in my area the pollution is a huge problem so the zero emission aspect of it really appeals to me. our air quality is piss poor here (phoenix), and unfortunately i have a 22 mile commute each way.
i looked and our power comes from a variety of sources: hydroelectric, thermal fuel, steam and nuclear. i'll have to look further to see if our specific home's power comes from one source or a combination of those sources.
You're so lucky, I'm jealous. So that would work when you charge the car at home. But if you're on the road, those "charging stations" Nissan touts that don't exist yet could get their electricity from any source. Plus it would be big hassle to have to wait 30 mins to recharge on long car trips. To avoid that, I think most people would have a regular car in addition to the Leaf. Which is why I think the gas/electric hybrid is the best choice right now until the technology advances to get a longer charge out of an all-electric car, and get the U.S. grid moved over to renewable energy.
yeah those charging stations are kinda odd. what are the chances that they would be near where you are when you need a charge? i don't see them getting a lot of use; these electric cars seem like a good alternative choice for commuters, not road trippers.
It's same marketing that pronents of ethanol or Flex Fuel cars use. "There will be charging/fueling stations everywhere!" when in actuality there are very few ethanol stations so those people who drive Flex Fuel cars just put regular gas in them, or the other side of the Flex. Same for the electric charging stations. I bet Nissan envisions that every gas station will have one, but gas station owners won't invest that much money unless there's a ton of electric cars, which there won't be until you can charge them on the road. A big catch-22. A Leaf would be great for commuters, but will increase the demand for electricity which nationwide still mostly comes from coal.
ETA; Plus, I bet you can only use the charging station one car at a time, and if it takes 30 minutes, then you're stuck waiting even longer.
Also don't want to rain on anyone's parade, but while I have not done extensive research on this, I hear that the process to make the Prius' battery is so un-ef that you may as well drive a hummer(factoring in production and trasportation of batteries to car production plant). I know your talking about a different car, but something to look in to.
Currently, I think clean diesel is the best car for a daily commuter. Like a Golf TDI, or a Jetta TDI.
The Leaf looks pretty cool, though. There is talk that the batteries will be leased to avoid any issues and ensure proper disposal.
I agree, and that was a major concern of mine when I bought my Prius. But I think that the more people who buy Prius's, the more likely Toyota is to have a good program in place to manufacture and dispose of them. And the more a technology is used, the better it gets. Take solar power for example. The more people who install it, the better the innovation the industry has to have to sell it, resulting in better and more EF technology.
As a side note, I don't think any battery manufacturing and transportation process really cancels out manufacturing, shipping, selling, and driving a huge nine mile per gallon SUV. God I hate Hummer!
I really like the lease idea for the Leaf battery, I wish my Prius had that.