Xtreme Power / Duke Energy, Notrees Energy Storage Project Photo courtesy of Messe Dusseldorf North America
Dr. Alan Gotcher is the star of the week. He is the CEO of Xtreme Power (power management and energy storage solutions). Xtreme Power and partner, Duke Energy, were recently honored as the winners of the Energy Storage North America Innovation Award for the Notrees Wind Energy Storage Project in Texas. Notrees is the largest wind energy storage system in North America with 36 MW of battery storage.
Xtreme Power / Duke Energy, Notrees Energy Storage Project Photo courtesy of Messe Dusseldorf North America
The Xtreme press release stated: “Xtreme Power and Duke Energy, the largest electric power holding company in the U.S., completed the Notrees project in December 2012 – providing environmentally friendly and flexible capacity to the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), which operates the electrical grid in Texas and manages 75% of the deregulated market in the state. The Notrees project represented Xtreme Power’s eighth successful project installation in one year. To date, Xtreme Power has installed 77 MW in the field and counted 25,239 MWh charged/discharged.”
Ford Motor has a Xtreme battery storage system with solar power (Detroit Edison) at Ford’s Michigan Assembly Plant in Wayne, Michigan. According to Ford, the solar battery storage system saves the company approximately $160,000 a year. At this plant, Ford manufactures the Focus Electric, C-Max energi and Fusion energi.
Dr. Gotcher has successfully developed several storage working models in the field and has attracted great attention with the significant 36 MW storage system at Notrees. Xtreme is a private company which has been funded since in its founding with over 90 million from some very notable investors, such as Dow Chemical, BP and Fluor. Xtreme Power is obviously one to watch.
Professor Alan Weimer (back row, fifth from left) is shown with his 2013 CU-Boulder research group that involves postdoctoral researchers, research professionals, graduate students and undergraduates who make up the largest academic solar-thermal chemistry team in United States. (Image courtesy University of Colorado)
A cutting-edge battery technology developed at the University of Colorado Boulder that could allow tomorrow’s electric vehicles to travel twice as far on a charge is now closer to becoming a commercial reality.
CU’s Technology Transfer Office has completed an agreement with Solid Power LLC—a CU-Boulder spinoff company founded by Se-Hee Lee and Conrad Stoldt, both associate professors of mechanical engineering—for the development and commercialization of an innovative solid-state rechargeable battery. Solid Power also was recently awarded a $3.4 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy for the purpose of creating a battery that can improve electric vehicle driving range.
The rechargeable batteries that are standard in today’s electric vehicles—as well as in a host of consumer electronics, such as mobile phones and laptops—are lithium-ion batteries, which generate electricity when lithium ions move back and forth between electrodes in a liquid electrolyte solution.
Engineers and chemists have long known that using lithium metal as the anode in a rechargeable battery—as opposed to the conventional carbon materials that are used as the anode in conventional lithium-ion batteries—can dramatically increase its energy density. But using lithium metal, a highly reactive solid, in conjunction with a liquid electrolyte is extremely hazardous because it increases the chance of a thermal runaway reaction that can result in a fire or an explosion.
Today’s lithium-ion batteries require a bulky amount of devices to protect and cool the batteries. A fire onboard a Boeing Dreamliner in January that temporarily grounded the new class of plane was linked to its onboard lithium-ion battery.
Lee and Stoldt solved the safety concerns around using lithium metal by eliminating the liquid electrolyte. Instead, the pair built an entirely solid-state battery that uses a ceramic electrolyte to separate the lithium metal anode from the cathode. Because the solid-state battery is far safer, it requires less protective packaging, which in turn could reduce the weight of the battery system in electric vehicles and help extend their range.
Research into the development of solid-state batteries has gone on for a couple of decades, but it has been difficult to create a solid electrolyte that allowed the ions to pass through it as easily as a liquid electrolyte.
“The problem has always been that solid electrolytes had very poor performance making their use in rechargeable batteries impractical,” Stoldt said. “However, the last decade has seen a resurgence in the development of new solid electrolytes with ionic conductivities that rival their liquid counterparts.”
The critical innovation added by Lee and Stoldt that allows their solid-state lithium battery to out-perform standard lithium-ion batteries is the construction of the cathode, the part of the battery that attracts the positively charged lithium ions once they’re discharged from the lithium metal. Instead of using a solid mass of material, Lee and Stoldt created a “composite cathode,” essentially small particles of cathode material held together with solid electrolyte and infused with an additive that increases its electrical conductivity. This configuration allows ions and electrons to move more easily within the cathode.
“The real innovation is an all-solid composite cathode that is based upon an iron-sulfur chemistry that we developed at CU,” Stoldt said. “This new, low-cost chemistry has a capacity that’s nearly 10 times greater than state-of-the-art cathodes.”
Last year, Lee and Stoldt partnered with Douglas Campbell, a small-business and early-stage product development veteran, to spin out Solid Power.
“We’re very excited about the opportunity to achieve commercial success for the all solid-state rechargeable battery,” said Campbell, Solid Power’s president. “We’re actively engaging industrial commercial partners to assist in commercialization and expect to have prototype products ready for in-field testing within 18 to 24 months.” Important to the early success of the company has been its incubation within CU-Boulder’s College of Engineering and Applied Science’s applied energy storage research center, a part of the college’s energy systems and environmental sustainability initiative.
Solid Power is a member of Rocky Mountain Innosphere, a nonprofit technology incubator headquartered in Fort Collins, Colo., with a mission to accelerate the development and success of high-impact scientific and technology startup companies.
“We’re very excited to be working with Solid Power’s team to get them to the next level,” said Mike Freeman, Innosphere’s CEO. “This is a big deal to Colorado’s clean-tech space. Solid Power’s batteries will have a huge impact in the EV market, and they have a potential $20 billion market for their technology.”
Learn more about Solid Power at http://www.solidpowerbattery.com.
This article is a repost (release 9-18-13), credit: University of Colorado.
Utility Scale Battery Storage, Laurel Mountain, Elkins, W. Virginia AES Energy Storage Photo courtesy of Messe Dusseldorf North America
The first staging of ENERGY STORAGE NORTH AMERICA (ESNA) from September 10 – 12, 2013 at the San Jose Convention Center in San Jose, California was a tremendous success. Jointly organized by Messe Düsseldorf North America and Strategen Consulting, ESNA 2013 is the first energy storage conference and exposition in the U.S. to focus exclusively on projects, applications, and deals. Over 740 attendees from 16 countries, representing 400 organizations, joined the event to celebrate successful projects and applications, share best practices and accelerate energy storage market development. 43 exhibitors demonstrated innovative technologies and applications to transform North America’s grid infrastructure. Some of the highlights included:
An all-electric MINI Cooper performing vehicle-to-grid frequency regulation on the expo floor presented by EV Grid
A full size ice thermal storage system presented by FAFCO
An awards ceremony celebrating the most innovative North American energy storage projects in 3 categories: Utility-scale, Customer sited/behind the meter, and Mobility
A learning lounge featuring 9 innovative companies working on energy storage deployment, including announcement of a new 60MWh flow battery under construction in Hokkaido, Japan by Sumitomo Electric
ENERGY STORAGE NORTH AMERICA 2013 coincided with the release of a California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) proposed decision that could bring 1.325GW of new energy storage resources to California load serving entities, pursuant to AB 2514. AB 2514 requires the CPUC to establish appropriate energy storage procurement targets for 2015 and 2020, if cost-effective and commercially viable, by October 2013. CPUC Commissioner Carla Peterman, who authored the proposed decision ordering the procurement targets, delivered the keynote talk at ENSA on September 11.
Later that morning, Commissioner Michel Florio announced that Southern California Edison’s awaited local capacity requirement (LCR) request for offers (RFO) for a minimum of 50MW of energy storage and up to 650 MW of energy storage and other preferred resources to be procured in the LA basin was expected to be released alter that day. Commissioner Florio had issued a decision requiring the LCR energy storage procurement earlier this year in the CPUC’s long-term procurement planning rulemaking. “Commissioner Peterman’s historic proposed decision and Commissioner Florio’s decision to require storage in LA provides a critically-needed market signal to realize the many benefits energy storage can bring to California’s ratepayers. We’re certain that other states will follow California’s example,” said Janice Lin, Managing Partner of Strategen Consulting and Chair of Energy Storage North America (ESNA) Conference and Expo 2013.
“We are delighted with the exhibitor and visitor participation. Sold-out exhibit space and the greater than expected attendance confirm the importance of ESNA as a leading and essential market place in the energy storage industry, providing a focused meeting place for projects and applications in this growing sector. Due to the large number of attendees and exhibitors at the 2013 show, we will hold ESNA 2014 in much larger space,” stated Tom Mitchell, President of Messe Düsseldorf North America.
ESNA thanks its 2013 Platinum Sponsors: Demand Energy Networks and NextEra Energy as well as gold sponsors: Bosch, Center for Sustainable Energy, Duke Energy, East Penn Manufacturing, FIAMM Energy Storage Solutions, K&L Gates, Pacific Gas & Electric, Parker Hannifin, Samsung SDI, San Diego Gas & Electric, Southern California Edison, Southern California Gas Company, Stem, Sumitomo Electric, Xtreme Power and our silver sponsors: CalCEF, CalCharge, and Coda Energy. ESNA’s event sponsors included AES Energy Storage, Flextronics, and Wells Fargo.
Supporting partners include: American Council On Renewable Energy (ACORE), Sandia National Laboratories, the Power Association of Northern California, CALSTART, Solar Energy Industries Association, California Solar Energy Industries Association, California Wind Energy Association, National Electrical Manufacturers Association, Semiconductor Equipment and Materials International, Enterprise, SF Environment, Independent Energy Producers, National Hydro Association, NY Best, Solar Energy Power Association, Southern California Public Power Authority, U.S. Department of Energy, United States Green Building Council – Northern California, the Clean Coalition, the Electricity Storage Association (ESA), the California Energy Storage Alliance (CESA), the Texas Energy Storage Alliance (TESA), the German Energy Storage Association (BVES), the China Energy Storage Alliance (CNESA) and the Indian Energy Storage Alliance (IESA), as well as Solarpraxis AG and Joint Venture Silicon Valley.
Energy Storage North America is officially part of the World of Energy Storage event group, including Energy Storage India to be held from December 04-06, 2013 in Mumbai/India, Energy Storage Europe will be held from March 25-27, 2014 in Düsseldorf/Germany, and Energy Storage China will be held from June 23-24, 2014 in Beijing/China.
The next Energy Storage North America is scheduled to be held from September 30–October 2, 2014.
This article is a repost, credit: Energy Storage North America, http://www.esnaexpo.com/.
Nearly triples size of Global Battery Systems Lab since opening in 2009
General Motors announces Monday, September 16, 2013, it has expanded its Global Battery Systems Laboratory in Warren, Michigan, where it tests and validates both battery cells and packs for all of GM’s vehicle electrification systems, including the battery systems for the Chevrolet Volt, Cadillac ELR, Chevrolet Spark EV and GM’s eAssist light electrification system. The expanded lab features dedicated equipment for future vehicle battery system development, building of prototype battery packs for vehicle development programs, and a hub for validation and testing of all future battery systems designed for use in GM vehicles. The facility is the largest battery lab in North America owned and operated by a major auto manufacturer. (Photo by John F. Martin for General Motors) Courtesy of GM
WARREN, Mich. – General Motors has nearly tripled the size of its Global Battery Systems Laboratory, cementing the lab’s stature as the largest battery lab in North America owned and operated by a major auto manufacturer.
The latest addition of 50,000 square feet brings to 85,000 the total square footage of the lab. The expansion made possible the increase in the number of pack-level test channels from 64 to 112 and cell-level test channels from 96 to120.
“In the past four years, the competitive landscape in the electrification space has grown exponentially. This has required us to raise our game and draw a new line in the sand,” said Doug Parks, GM vice president, global product programs. “To maintain our battery leadership, this additional real estate is filled with new capability that will help us improve speed to market for our next generation of battery systems and help us improve the value equation to our customers around the world.”
GM’s Global Battery Systems Lab has been responsible for testing and validating both battery cells and packs for all of GM’s vehicle electrification systems, including the battery systems for the Chevrolet Volt, Cadillac ELR, Chevrolet Spark EV and GM’s eAssist light electrification system.
The additional capabilities of the lab expansion include:
dedicated equipment for future vehicle battery system development such as charger development and testing, cord set testing and competitive benchmarking;
building prototype battery packs for vehicle development programs; and,
the ability to act as the hub for validation and testing of all battery systems designed for use in future GM vehicles around the world.
The lab will also play a critical role in assuring GM’s current generation of electric vehicles maintain their battery leadership position. Teams will validate and test updates to existing chemistries and system designs to make the most of performance and reduce cost. For example, updates were made to the battery system in 2013 Chevrolet Volt that added three miles of EV range.
GM Battery Lab Photo courtesy of GM
“GM is committed to vehicle electrification and our products in this area must continue to excite customers. A critical part of this plan is to deliver safe, reliable and affordable energy storage systems,” said Larry Nitz, GM’s executive director of global electrification engineering. “The new capabilities of this lab will enhance our engineers’ ability to design, develop, process and validate class-leading products to meet the needs of our growing customer base.”
In addition to the lab in Michigan, GM also operates battery labs in Shanghai, China, and Mainz-Kastel, Germany, which are tasked with testing and validation of battery cells, packs, and advanced battery system development. Teams at the China, Germany and Michigan labs work collectively to test battery systems around the clock to reduce validation time.
Facts: Global Battery Systems Battery Lab
Alternative Energy Center, GM Technical Center, Warren, Mich.
History:
Lab completed: May 2009
Expansion completed: July 2013
Size:
Expansion total floor space: 50,000 sq.-ft.
Lab total floor space: 85,000 sq.-ft.
16,500 sq. ft. – Pack testing, Support
18,500 sq. ft. – Cell / Module testing, Vibration #1, Safety and Abuse #1, Support
30,000 sq. ft. – Safety and Abuse #2, Manufacturing Support, Pack Build, Test, Storage
20,000 sq. ft. – Software / Dev. Test, Vibration #2, Modal test, Software / Dev. Support
Benefits:
Increased pack testing
New cell and module testing
Additional capabilities
New Vibration testing area with added Modal testing capability
Charger testing
Immersion testing (pack seals)
Hardware in the Loop / Software in the Loop testing and development
Manufacturing Engineering area for support of assembly plants (equipment partially funded by the U.S. Department of Energy)
Enhanced capability
Welding of battery systems: Development of new ultrasonic and laser weld capabilities.
Battery system mock-up capabilities: Tooling to hand-build modules, sections and validate parts.
Prototype pack build area
About General Motors Co.
General Motors Co. (NYSE:GM, TSX: GMM) and its partners produce vehicles in 30 countries, and the company has leadership positions in the world’s largest and fastest-growing automotive markets. GM, its subsidiaries and joint venture entities sell vehicles under the Chevrolet, Cadillac, Baojun, Buick, GMC, Holden, Isuzu, Jiefang, Opel, Vauxhall and Wuling brands. More information on the company and its subsidiaries, including OnStar, a global leader in vehicle safety, security and information services, can be found at http://www.gm.com.
This article is a repost, credit: General Motors, http://www.gm.com.
Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz Photo courtesy of DOE
WASHINGTON — Building on President Obama’s Climate Action Plan to build a 21st century transportation sector and reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the Energy Department announced today more than $45 million for thirty-eight new projects that accelerate the research and development of vehicle technologies to improve fuel efficiency, lower transportation costs and protect the environment in communities nationwide.
“By partnering with universities, private industry and our national labs, the Energy Department is helping to build a strong 21st century transportation sector that cuts harmful pollution, creates jobs and leads to a more sustainable energy future,” said Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz. “By improving the fuel economy of our cars and trucks, we can save families and businesses money at the pump and better protect our air and water.”
The Obama Administration has taken unprecedented steps to improve the fuel efficiency of American vehicles, establishing the toughest fuel economy standards for passenger vehicles in U.S. history. These standards are expected to save consumers $1.7 trillion at the pump — or more than $8,000 in costs over the lifetime of each vehicle – and eliminate six billion metric tons of carbon pollution. Innovative technologies and manufacturing are helping U.S. automakers achieve the goals of this historic agreement, and the investment announced today will help provide new technologies and innovations to enable automakers to continue to improve vehicle fuel efficiency.
Through the Advanced Vehicle Power Technology Alliance between the Energy Department and the Department of the Army, the Army is contributing an additional $3 million in co-funding to support projects focused on lightweighting and propulsion materials, batteries, fuels and lubricants. “Working with the Energy Department, we are accelerating the development and deployment of cutting-edge technologies to strengthen our military, economy, and energy security,” said Dr. Paul Rogers, director the U.S. Army Tank Automotive Research, Development and Engineering Center.
The 38 projects announced today span five major areas critical to advanced transportation technologies, such as lightweighting and propulsion materials as well as affordable, efficient batteries, power electronics, fuels and lubricants, and efficient heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems, and include:
Advanced lightweighting and propulsion materials (15 projects; $10.2 million): Advanced materials are essential for boosting the fuel economy of cars and trucks while maintaining and improving safety and performance. Next generation lightweight materials can reduce passenger car weight by up to 50 percent. Reducing a vehicle’s weight by just10 percent can improve fuel economy by 6 to 8 percent. These projects will conduct research on lightweight materials — such as advanced high-strength steel, magnesium and aluminum – that allow vehicle manufacturers to include electric drive components, electronic systems and emissions control equipment without increasing vehicle weight.
Advanced batteries (13 projects; $22.5 million): In the last four years, the cost of a plug-in electric vehicle battery has come down by nearly 50 percent. The awards announced today will help improve cell chemistry and composition, develop advanced electrolytes and create new battery design tools – helping to further reduce costs. Broadly, the projects aim to cut battery size and weight in half, while improving efficiency and performance.
Power electronics (Four projects; $8 million): Compared to silicon-based technologies, wide bandgap semiconductors – such as silicon carbide and gallium nitride – can operate at higher temperatures, have greater durability and reliability, and can lower the cost and improve performance of plug-in electric vehicle inverters. Separately, new approaches to enable high-temperature operation and cost reduction for capacitors in these inverters will also help to reduce the cost of vehicle power electronics. These projects will contribute to reducing the cost of a plug-in electric vehicle inverter by more than 30 percent.
Advanced heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems (Two projects; $4 million): Reducing the impact of heating and cooling on plug-in electric vehicles can significantly increase all-electric driving range. These two projects are focused on developing innovative heating and cooling technologies that reduce battery demands and improve range by 20 to 30 percent.
Fuels and lubricants (Four projects; $2.5 million): These projects will develop advanced fuels and lubricants that can reduce friction losses and increase the efficiency of cars already on the market and next generation passenger vehicles.
These new projects support the goals of the Energy Department’s EV Everywhere Grand Challenge, a broader initiative to make plug-in electric vehicles as affordable and convenient to own and drive as today’s gasoline-powered vehicles within 10 years.
This article is a repost, credit: US Department of Energy, http://energy.gov/.
Researchers (left to right) Dileep Singh, Carlo Segre, Mike Duoba, John Katsoudas, Elena Timofeeva, and Chris Pelliccione stand by one of the plug-in electric vehicles they hope to revolutionize with the IIT-Argonne “nanoelectrofuel” flow battery technology they are developing. Photo courtesy of Argonne National Laboratory
CHICAGO – Carlo Segre, Duchossois Leadership Professor of Physics at Illinois Institute of Technology, has received a $3.4 million award from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA-E) to develop a breakthrough battery technology that may more than double the current range of electric vehicles (EV), increase safety, reduce costs and simplify recharging.
Segre and his collaborators John Katsoudas, also of IIT, and Elena Timofeeva, Dileep Singh and Michael Duoba of Argonne National Laboratory will develop a prototype for a rechargeable “nanoelectrofuel” flow battery that may extend the range of EVs to at least 500 miles and provide a straightforward and rapid method of refueling. Current EV ranges are 100-200 miles, with recharging taking up to eight hours.
Flow batteries, which store chemical energy in external tanks instead of within the battery container, are generally low in energy density and therefore not used for transportation applications. The IIT-Argonne nanoelectrofuel flow battery concept will use a high-energy density “liquid” with battery-active nanoparticles to dramatically increase energy density while ensuring stability and low-resistance flow within the battery.
“I am delighted by this award, not only because of the quality and importance of the proposed research but also as another example of the longstanding and effective collaboration between IIT and the world-class researchers and facilities at Argonne,” said Russell Betts, dean of the College of Science at IIT.
Segre’s expertise is in the structure and properties of materials using synchrotron radiation techniques. He has a wide variety of ongoing research projects, including fuel-cell catalysts and battery materials. Segre is deputy director of the Materials Research Collaborative Access Team (MR-CAT) beamline at the Advanced Photon Source (APS), located at Argonne; and director of the Center for Synchrotron Radiation Research and Instrumentation (CSRRI) at IIT.
Katsoudas and Timofeeva began their work on the IIT-Argonne nanoelectrofuel flow battery at Argonne, leveraging Timofeeva’s expertise in nanofluids engineering and electrochemistry. Katsoudas is an expert in instrumentation design, automation of experiments and materials characterization.
Singh will bring to bear on the project his knowledge of how nanoparticle-fluid interaction effects the thermal management and behavior of nanoparticles in the IIT-Argonne nanoelectrofuel flow battery. Duoba’s expertise in vehicle systems and EV testing, in particular, will provide critical guidance in the development of a nanoelectrofuel battery prototype for EV applications.
The IIT award is one of 22 projects across the country awarded a total of $36 million through the DOE’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy Robust Affordable Next Generation EV Storage (RANGE) program, which seeks to develop innovative EV battery chemistries, architectures and designs. ARPA-E was officially authorized in 2007 and first funded in 2009. The agency invests in high-potential, high-impact energy technologies that are too early for private sector investment.
IIT and Argonne will share the funding award to continue their research.
Founded in 1890, IIT is a Ph.D.-granting university offering degrees in engineering, sciences, architecture, psychology, design, humanities, business, and law. IIT’s interprofessional, technology-focused curriculum is designed to advance knowledge through research and scholarship, to cultivate invention improving the human condition, and to prepare students from throughout the world for a life of professional achievement, service to society, and individual fulfillment. Visit www.iit.edu.
Argonne National Laboratory seeks solutions to pressing national problems in science and technology. The nation’s first national laboratory, Argonne conducts leading-edge basic and applied scientific research in virtually every scientific discipline. Argonne researchers work closely with researchers from hundreds of companies, universities, and federal, state and municipal agencies to help them solve their specific problems, advance America’s scientific leadership and prepare the nation for a better future. With employees from more than 60 nations, Argonne is managed by UChicago Argonne, LLC for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science.
This article is a repost (news release 8-30-13), credit: Argonne National Laboratory, http://www.anl.gov/.
Nissan plans to provide a Nissan LEAF all-electric EV and LEAF to Home power supply system to roadside rest areas in all 47 prefectures of Japan.
Donations will be used to provide power after natural disasters and enhance the daily lives of local residents.
Photo courtesy of Nissan
IRVINE, Calif. — Nissan Motor Co., Ltd. plans to donate 47 Nissan LEAF all-electric zero-emission EVs and “LEAF to Home” power supply systems to roadside rest area stations in all of Japan’s 47 prefectures. The plan will begin in September 2013. One Nissan LEAF*, paired with a LEAF-to-Home power system, will be donated by Nissan to at least one roadside rest area (called michi-no-eki in Japanese) to each prefecture in the country.
Electric vehicles can serve as portable sources of electrical power both in day-to-day living and during emergencies, such as power blackouts following earthquakes or hurricanes. The Nissan LEAF, paired with the “LEAF to Home” power supply system, can be used as back-up power source in emergency situations if there are power outages and/or shortages by providing the stored electricity held in the Nissan LEAF’s onboard batteries. In normal situations, the LEAF to Home power supply system helps stabilize the electrical grid and balance energy needs by charging an EV with electricity generated during the night, when demand is low, or sourced from solar panels and supplying it to homes during daytime when demand is high.
The michi-no-eki network in Japan has three functions: a rest area for travelers, an information source for local residents and road users, and a cooperative community function in which towns reach out to each other to work together to build vibrant communities centered on activities held at the michi-no-eki stations. As the stations are public facilities often located alongside important arterial roads, in recent years they serve as bases of operations during natural disasters.
The lithium-ion batteries of Nissan LEAF can store 24kWh of electricity. With the “LEAF to Home” power supply system complemented by a Nissan LEAF, power can be supplied from a Nissan LEAF to some parts of a michi-no-eki’s facilities in case of power outages caused by disasters. It is expected that these michi-no-eki road stations will function as evacuation centers for local residents or a base for restoration support activities in the event of a natural disaster.
The donated Nissan LEAFs can be used as vehicles to transport the elderly and expecting mothers who find it difficult to purchase food and daily commodities at the roadside stations’ stores.
The Nissan LEAF is the best-selling electric vehicle in the world, with 75,000 LEAFs sold to date. As a leader in zero-emission mobility, Nissan is continuing to develop electric vehicles while engaging in comprehensive efforts to expand the use of electric vehicles and promote sustainable mobility.
To learn about Nissan’s zero emission initiatives, please see: http://www.nissan-zeroemission.com/EN/LEAF/
*The Nissan LEAFs to be donated for this project have previously been used for test drives at Nissan dealers.
About Nissan
Nissan Motor Co., Ltd., Japan’s second-largest automotive company, is headquartered in Yokohama, Japan, and is part of the Renault-Nissan Alliance. Operating with more than 236,000 employees globally, Nissan sold more than 4.9 million vehicles and generated revenue of 9.6 trillion yen (USD 116.16 billion) in fiscal 2012. Nissan delivers a comprehensive range of over 60 models under the Nissan and Infiniti brands. In 2010, Nissan introduced the Nissan LEAF, and continues to lead in zero-emission mobility. The LEAF, the first mass-market, pure-electric vehicle launched globally, is now the best-selling EV in history.
For more information on our products, services and commitment to sustainable mobility, visit our website at http://www.nissan-global.com/EN/.
This article is a repost, credit: Nissan, http://nissannews.com/en-US/nissan/usa.
