Electric Dream: Nissan unveiled the latest zero emission electric car prototype for the city of the future
Last updated 10/7/2008 1:23:41 PM
Plug and play. Future EVs will be more eco-friendly and adapt perfectly into urban dwellers life. Photos © Zarina Holmes.
Nissan has unveiled Nuvu, a green concept electric vehicle (EV) for the city of the future that’s even more crowded than today, at the recent Paris Salon.
It is estimated that within the next five to seven years, some 55% of the world’s population will live in the city, threatening total gridlock.
Unless something is done, the irony of the phrase ‘personal mobility’ will be self-evident.
Nissan is leading the race for a more sustainable EV by creating Nuvu, a ‘new view’ of the type of car we will be driving in the middle of the next decade.
“There is a new generation coming up who, finally, are questioning why we do the things we do. They are asking themselves, for example, why they are buying a large car when they know that for 99% of the time they will be in it on their own,” says François Bancon, Exploratory and Advance Planning Department, Product Strategy and Product Planning Division, Nissan Motor Co., Ltd.
“We did a great deal of research into how people use their cars in the city. We found that for 90% of the time, the driver was alone. 5% of the time there was one passenger and for 4% of the time there were two passengers,” he explained.
Nissan has already announced plans to introduce an all-electric car in Japan and the US in 2010 and to mass-market it globally in 2012.
Nuvu is not that car, although it does share some of the technology that will feature in the planned production vehicle. Rather, it is a concept of how a Nissan EV might look in the near future.