Could the lithium-ion battery pack in the Nissan Leaf suffer old age before you’re ready to dispose of your electric vehicle? Reports suggest high-mileage Leafs can experience a noticeable drop in battery capacity in the first year or so of ownership, which means decreased driving range — and owner satisfaction — in following years.
A new Leaf gets about 85 miles per charge (what is often called “up to 100 miles”). Some Leaf owners in hot-weather climates who drove a lot, nearly 20,000 miles a year, have found they’re only getting 60 or so miles per charge 12-14 months into the cars’ lives. Nissan says the “glide path” for a normal Leaf’s battery degradation is down to 70%-80% capacity after five years and about 70% after 10 years so these batteries may be getting old before their time. The issue is not minor: The manufacturing cost of the Leaf’s battery is around $15,000, so replacing the battery is half the cost of the car.
For Nissan and its reputation, the stakes are also high if it can’t satisfy the squeaky owners who’ve found their way online to tell their side.
As the Nissan Leaf came to market in late 2010, Nissan projected a range of about 100 miles for the cars and their 24kWh lithium-ion battery packs. Nissan modified the range to around 85 miles and cited absolute worst case-best case range of 50 to 130 miles. The EPA set it at 73 miles. In a recent test by Phoenix-area owners of a group of year-old Leafs, some got as little as 60 miles on a full battery charge. They’ve been worried because 12 to 14 months into their cars lives, they’re seeing one or two segments of the 12-segment charge indicators not light up, even after a full charge.
The Leaf manual says the first missing bar represents a 15% falloff in capacity; additional bars represent half that. These are not normal cars though, Nissan notes. The units have an average of more than 19,000 miles on them versus an expected norm of 12,500 miles per year and they’re in a warm region that had an unseasonably hot summer. Still, Nissan this week said it will launch an investigation to determine what’s up.
The battery life “glide path,” as Nissan puts it, is for the big Li-Ion pack to retain 70%-80% of its charging and storage capabilities after five years of life and about 70% after 10 years. The Phoenix owners believe the downward slope is a lot steeper, sooner. In a recent owner range test this month of a half-dozen Leafs in Phoenix, some got as little as 60 miles of range on fully charged batteries, according to InsideEVS.com. The test was run with air conditioning off (good for the battery if not the occupants) but much of the the test route was at highway speed (less good for battery life because there’s little chance for regeneration).
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