Are These Renderings The Next-Gen Nissan LEAF?

April 7th, 2017 by Zachary Shahan

Sometime back, Pedro Lima of PushEVs — a Portuguese dude who seems to have some close connections to people in the EV battery world and deep knowledge of EV batteries — posted some potentially legit renderings of the next-gen Nissan LEAF. We published about them at the time, but also took them with a grain of salt — renderings of future cars are a dime a dozen.

The odd thing is that I don’t recall Pedro ever seeing where he got the renderings, and he’s quite thorough about referencing sources.

As spy shots of camouflaged 2018 Nissan LEAFs have been popping up, I’m more and more convinced that the renderings below are legit renderings from Nissan. Take a look at the renderings below and then spy shots on Autoblog, AutoExpress, and PushEVs.

I personally like the look of the original Nissan LEAF, but I’m well aware that many people don’t like it. I think this rendering (and what the camouflaged LEAFs we’ve seen) shows is a more mainstream design that is also sportier and still features a bit of the unique appeal of the original LEAF. I love it.

Beyond looks, Pedro picked up some other information about one of the undercover LEAFs.

Micky65 from the German forum goingelectric.de took the shot we see above and was able to retrieve some details about the new generation Nissan Leaf.

First, the Nissan Leaf in the photo above has a CHAdeMO socket, this means that Nissan should keep pushing the Japanese fast charging standard, even in Europe and the USA. I have hoped that Nissan would finally adopt CCS and type 2 in Europe, especially since the Leaf is also made here, maybe someday…

Second, the battery capacity is around 40 kWh, as it was initially planed and I reported last year. However, since Nissan delayed the introduction of the new generation Nissan Leaf, I questioned myself if it meant that Nissan decided at the last minute that 40 kWh wouldn’t be enough, and was going to 60 kWh. I do foresee the introduction of a 60 kWh battery option in 2018, this way the Nissan Micra EV can get the 41 kWh battery from Renault Zoe and not cannibalize Leaf’s sales.

That’s an interesting hypothesis at the end. It would be superb if Nissan offered a low-price Nissan Micra EV with a 40 kWh battery, but I’m skeptical about that. I’m not saying it won’t happen — I hope it does! — but I haven’t seen indication from Nissan that it would head in that direction. Additionally, the Micra isn’t available in the US, and I’d think Nissan would first electrify models that can be sold in the US and Europe.

Pedro also notes that the interior shot of the undercover LEAF doesn’t show much but that it appears to be the same as the interior in the autonomous Nissan LEAF featured on “Fully Charged” (video below).

As we’ve reported previously, “the refreshed Nissan LEAF is, in addition to a revamped appearance, expected to possess a much improved range and Nissan’s semi-autonomous ProPilot driving features — which will reportedly allow for fully autonomous single-lane highway travel.”











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