The USA Today
By Yuri Kageyama
Published: July 9, 2008
The Nissan-Renault auto alliance has formed a partnership with the Portuguese government with plans to sell electric vehicles in Portugal in 2011. Carlos Ghosn, chief executive of the French and Japanese automakers, and Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Socrates on Wednesday presided at the signing of a memorandum of understanding which aims to lay the groundwork for use of electric vehicles in Portugal and dispel doubts about their feasibility.
Ghosn said the public-private agreement represented a new business model that seeks to "develop the necessary conditions for zero-emission vehicles to become a viable, attractive and popular" mode of transport.
Socrates said Portugal is willing to act as "a laboratory for future electric cars."
Ghosn said zero-emission vehicles are "one of the main business priorities in the short and long term" for the automotive giant, which aims to sell them worldwide by 2012. Rival manufacturers are also planning electric vehicles.
The move is the latest in Nissan's aggressive forging of deals with cities and governments on electric vehicles as soaring gas prices and worries about global warming make the green technology more appealing.
Tokyo-based Nissan Motor and alliance partner Renault have previously announced deals with Project Better Place, which promotes electric vehicles, to mass market electric vehicles in Israel and Denmark in 2011.
While other car manufacturers are concentrating on fuel cells and hybrids, Nissan is going all out on electric vehicles, promising to sell the emissions-free cars globally in 2012, with the first models arriving in Japan and the U.S. in 2010.
"We are feeling more strongly than ever that we must speed up our development of electric vehicles," said Nissan Senior Vice President Minoru Shinohara.
Nissan is also in talks with parking lot and railway companies on deals to put recharging stations near commuter stations, he told the Associated Press at the company's Tokyo headquarters Wednesday.
The lack of widespread recharging sites is one of the main complaints about electric cars. That limits their use to controlled environments such as golf courses and airports and helps to keep them out of the general consumer market.
And when that's combined with the drawback of high costs and other technological hurdles, electrical vehicles for the broader public are still experimental so far.
Proponents say tax breaks, preferential highways lanes and other incentives will boost their appeal.
"It's still a very new technology and so much remains to be seen," said Yasuaki Iwamoto, auto analyst with Okasan Securities. "It's unlikely people are suddenly going to switch in big numbers from gas-engine vehicles."
Still, Nissan appears to be ahead of rivals in signing electric vehicle projects, Iwamato said.
Portugal is a global leader in promoting renewable energy, including wind and solar power.
"This agreement with Renault-Nissan will place Portugal also on the front line in terms of sustainable mobility with zero-emission vehicles," Socrates said. "Promoting electric cars in Portugal will reduce our dependence on imported oil and will contribute to a cleaner environment."
Shinohara said city-dwellers in Japan drive about 12 miles a day — so the limited range of electric vehicles isn't a problem for daily grocery shopping and other errands.
Nissan has not yet given details of the electric vehicle it has in the works.
Fuji Heavy Industries, which makes Subaru cars, and Mitsubishi Motors, plans to offer their electric vehicles in Japan next year. Mitsubishi's electric vehicle travels 99 miles on a single charge, while Subaru's goes 50 miles.
Mitsubishi plans to sell its electric vehicle in Europe in 2010, while tests are planned for the U.S. for 2009. Subaru has not decided on overseas sales plans for its electric vehicle.
Masahiko Otsuka, president of Automotive Energy Supply, a joint venture between Nissan and Japanese electronics maker NEC, to produce batteries for electric vehicles, said Nissan has a history dating back to 1992 of testing lithium-ion batteries for cars.
Lithium-ion batteries are now more common in laptops and other gadgets but can pack more power than the kind of batteries in rival offerings like Toyota Motor gas-electric hybrids.
Otsuka said the plant planned for operation next year will be more extensively automated than rival plants, allowing battery plants to be more easily set up abroad, including emerging economies.
Major automakers are all working on ecological technology.
Nissan's Japanese rival Honda Motor is leasing in California a fuel-cell vehicle, which emits only water by running on the power created when hydrogen fuel combines with oxygen in the air.
U.S. automaker General Motors is developing a plug-in electric vehicle called the Chevrolet Volt, which it hopes to launch in 2010. Ford Motor has a demonstration fleet of 20 plug-ins through a partnership with Southern California Edison.
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