Seattle will be one of the first cities where Nissan sells a new electric car, and the city will help make the vehicles viable here, officials from the city and auto maker said Tuesday.
The new plug-in vehicle will be able to exceed highway speed limits, go 100 miles on a charge and recharge in four to eight hours using a 220-volt line, similar to those for clothes dryers, said Mark Perry, director of product planning for Nissan North America.
It will seat five, be similar in size to Nissan's Versa and Sentra and be affordable to a typical family, he said. "We think the market is ready. We think the consumers are ready."
In an agreement between Nissan and the city of Seattle, the automaker says it intends to sell the cars in the Seattle area and work with government and other organizations and companies on a plan to promote the cars and creation of a network of charging facilities.
Seattle says it intends to help develop the charging network; consider incentives for buying and using the cars, and creating charging stations; consider regulatory changes to support the cars, such as streamlined permitting for installing charging outlets; and consider leasing or buying the cars for its fleet.
Electric cars are part of the electrification of the city's transit system -- along with trackless trolleys, streetcars and light rail -- helping lessen dependence on foreign oil and reduce pollution, Mayor Greg Nickels said. "Our transportation system today is about 98 and a half percent based on burning fossil fuels."
Gregg Small, executive director of environmental nonprofit Climate Solutions, said electric cars could be a big part of achieving energy independence and addressing climate change, if done in conjunction with energy conservation.
"If we do things the wrong way, that's going to mean building more power plants, more dirty coal plants," he said.
Nissan plans to roll out the car in 12 to 15 markets next year, Perry said. He said company officials chose Seattle because the population is "at the forefront of really living its environmental ethos" and because the city runs on clean hydroelectric power.
The company will concentrate on getting charging facilities in homes and workplaces, because that's where cars are most of the time, and 98 percent of trips are within the car's 100-mile range, Perry said.
It will also look at other places, such as garages, gyms, movie theaters and museums, to ease consumer concerns about running out of juice, he said. "These public charging stations are really the pill to solve the disease we call range anxiety."
The stations will have a standardized outlet that will accommodate other companies' plug-in cars, Nickels said. "We would welcome any other manufacturers of this kind of technology to come here, and we would expect that infrastructure to work for any of the manufacturers."
Perry would not say just what the car would cost or how many the company planned to offer in Seattle next year, other than: "It's going to be way more than two."
The city has not committed to buying plug-in cars, although it is modifying some hybrid Toyota Priuses to be plug-ins, Nickels said. "We will take a look at the products and see how they meet our business needs."
Dan Davids, president of Plug In America, drove his plug-in Toyota RAV4 to Tuesday's news conference and lauded Nissan's announcement.
"Hats off to Nissan. They are doing it right," he said. "By committing to all-electric, it shows their confidence that the technology is ready."
Davids said his family meets its need for longer trips by also owning a hybrid Prius.
"I realize not everybody has two cars in their household, but a lot of America does," he said, adding that other options included renting a car when needed or using a flex-car program.
