Nissan is heralding the beginning of the ‘age of the electric car’ today as the first of regular shipments of its all-electric Leaf model arrives in North East England today.
The 67 Nissan LEAFs aboard the ‘City of St. Petersburg’, will be unloaded from the Port of Tyne as the carrier completes its maiden voyage. Nissan’s brand new energy-saving car carrier will make the first of many Leaf shipments today, as it takes responsibility for transporting Nissan vehicles across Europe. All the first 67 models are intended for customers in the UK and Ireland and arrive ahead of the vehicle’s official UK release date set for March 2011.
“The arrival of the Nissan LEAF, the world’s first affordable, all-electric car, in Europe is a landmark day for Nissan and European transport. The Nissan LEAF is a genuine alternative to petrol and diesel cars in terms of style, features, safety, performance and handling,” said Simon Thomas, senior vice president of sales and marketing at Nissan International SA, Nissan’s European headquarters.
“It is fitting that this first shipment of Nissan LEAFs is arriving on our new energy-saving car carrier, the City of St. Petersburg. We look forward to delivering these cars to the very first Nissan LEAF customers, who share our vision for an environmentally sustainable future for road transport,” he added.
The City of St. Petersburg has a sleek and semi-spherical bow which reduces wind resistance by up to 50 per cent, resulting in fuel reductions of up to 800 tonnes annually, equivalent to about 2,500 tonnes of CO2 emissions. The carrier will join the fleet of ships which export hundreds of thousands of vehicles from Nissan Sunderland Plant each year.
UK customers have been able to pre-order the Nissan LEAF since September 2010 ahead of deliveries starting in the coming weeks. Pre-orders for the Nissan LEAF, which is powered by an advanced lithium-ion battery, have reached more than 27,000 units globally. The zero-emission car is currently built in Japan, but will be manufactured in Sunderland from 2013, following the start of production of lithium-ion batteries for such cars at the plant in 2012.
The Leaf costs £23,990 with a Government Plug-in Car Grant subsidy worth £5,000. The five seat hatchback has a top speed of 90 miles an hour and a range of around 100 miles on a single charge.
