Have You Been Dying For An Electrified Nissan NV That Vaguely Resembles A Leaf? Here You Go!
Nissan now has a zero emissions van that you’ll be able to buy in a couple years -if that’s what you’re into. We won’t judge. Either way, the company seems to be creating a brand identity for its electric vehicles.
Notice how there are vague cues that harken to the Nissan Leaf in the e-NV200’s styling? That’s not a coincidence. Creating this sort of common look between the Leaf and e-NV200 is certainly intentional, and don’t be surprised to see it on future Nissan EVs. It worked for Toyota and the Prius, so of course Nissan is going to try it out here. No details about cost, powertrain or anything worthwhile were announced, just that Nissan will be building it at the same Barcelona plant as the standard NV, and 700 workers will be hired.
More by Derek Kreindler
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The overall shape and the side windows are almost exactly the same as of Toyota Yaris Verso - one of the silliest looking cars ever.
It also vaguely resembles a Cube, too. Those windows wouldn't keep kids (or dogs) very entertained.
Can we expect an addendum to "Commercial Truck Week" when this van is available to be tested? Like most cars, this will probably look just fine in black. In LEAF blue, it just looks like a gorged LEAF.
With regard to the title's question, "Have You Been Dying For An Electrified Nissan NV That Vaguely Resembles A Leaf?", I actually HAVE been looking for exactly such a thing. My wife wants an electric car to replace or supplement her Prius. We're moving in a year to Seattle, home of cheap and abundant clean power (hydroelectric and wind alike). We could live with a range of 100 miles, and Seattle has many public charging points even today. So no problems with EVs as a category. The problem is that the current options are too small for burgeoning young families, particularly in rear seat room. The Leaf's rear legroom is 31.x" iirc, which is insufficient for modern, huge rear-facing car seats. (The Focus, Electric variant or not, isn't much better.) Options given our constraints include the Toyota RAV4 EV (cons: limited production, would have to travel to Cali to get one, possibly lacking in local support in Seattle?); the electrified Ford Transit Connect (cons: not sure of current status since Azure Dynamics went tits up last month); various expensive aftermarket conversions with nonexistent local support; and now this, the e-NV200. If it materializes and is not only sold outright but sold outright in the US (Seattle specifically) then it could be a contender. That's a lot of ifs...