As part of Nissan’s Zero Emission tour, the Leaf electric car rolled through Portland and was on display at the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (OMSI) and finishes up at Washington Square Mall on December 23rd.  Through the magic of modern digital imagery, “virtual test drives” are being offered (no, I didn’t actually get to drive the Leaf near Oregon’s Mt. Hood).

Tour staff are on hand to field questions and answer in much greater detail than the Nissan website.  From firsthand observation I’d say the Leaf has a much different presence than all the images I’ve seen in print and on the web.   

Notwithstanding the electric powertrain technology, I think one of the coolest features of the Leaf EV is the ability to pre-heat or pre-cool your car through messages sent from your cell phone.  Although the fundamental reason is to conserve energy stored in the battery by using grid connected electricity (also known as shore power if you’re a boater) to power the car’s HVAC system thus taking the heating or cooling load off the batteries, this is a great feature for any car.  With this feature a driver has the ability to always get into a ”climate comfortable” parked car with a simple command from their phone.

Besides such novel features, an electric car will have a much different user-experience than a gas car.  Change is in the air - I’d definitely recommend checking it out to learn more about electric car technology as we’ll be seeing more electric cars in the future.

Here is the full list of cities and dates to check out the car on tour:

•  Los Angeles: Nov. 13-17
• Orange County: Nov. 18
• San Diego: Nov. 19-21
• Berkeley/Walnut Creek: Nov. 23-24
• San Francisco: Nov. 25-29
• Santa Rosa: Dec. 1
• Sacramento: Dec. 1
• San Jose: Dec. 3-6
• Seattle: Dec. 8-12
• Vancouver, Canada: Dec. 14-15
• Portland, Oregon: Dec. 17-23
• Phoenix/Tucson: Dec. 30-Jan. 5
• Las Vegas: Jan. 6
• Detroit: Jan. 11-13
• Knoxville/Chattanooga, Tenn.: Jan. 16
• Middle Tennessee: Jan. 19-21
• Washington, D.C.: Jan. 26-28
• Raleigh, N.C.: Jan. 29
•  Orlando: Feb. 1-2
• Houston: Feb. 5-6
• New York City: Feb. 9-14

The car won’t be sold nationwide until 2012, though reservations will be opened next spring with the intent to collect pre-orders.  The Leaf will be offered first for sale in late 2010 in test markets of Seattle, Portland, San Diego, Phoenix / Tucson, and Nashville (home of its U.S. headquarters) as part of TheEVProject.com, a pilot project to deploy electric car charging infrastructure in conjunction with Nissan’s Leaf electric cars to evaluate the effectiveness of charge infrastructure and conduct trials of various revenue systems for commercial and public charge infrastructure.  That’s when first deliveries of 5,000 Leaf electric cars will go to selected fleets and up to 5,000 consumers in these first markets.

Even before starting the Leaf tour Nissan has been signing up interested buyer prospects.  Preliminary early interest amongst Oregonians for the Leaf was publicly shared during the recent EV Roadmap event, of which I was a participant.  In a subsequent post I’ll review the distribution of prospective electric car buyers in Oregon and compare against other early adopters.  Because Portland Oregon leads the nation in hybrid car ownership, Oregon is expected to be a strong market for electric cars and clean vehicles.

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