Seattle gets first peek at Nissan electric car

While international diplomats are meeting in Copenhagen this week to hash out a new climate policy, the car company Nissan came to Seattle looking to inspire a few, well, guinea pigs in an experiment to see how its new all-electric car will fit the American lifestyle.

About a year from now, some 900 Seattle-area drivers will have the chance to buy a Nissan Leaf. Not only will they be getting one of the first mass-produced, highway-capable, battery-powered automobiles — they'll also help answer questions about what it will take to make such cars practical.

The driving habits of those first adopters — who will spend $28,000 to $35,000 for the car before a federal tax credit of $7,500 — will be closely studied by scientists at the Idaho National Laboratory, an applied-engineering lab that does federal energy research.

Scientists will study how the cars are driven, as well as how often and where motorists charge them. The data collected will help federal and local governments figure out how to build a charging network that's envisioned to one day stretch across the continent.

"This is on our way to showing America how to make electric cars the petroleum-free way to get around," said Rich Feldman, the Pacific Northwest regional manager of eTec, an Arizona-based company that will coordinate the federal grant to build charging stations.

The car can be charged using a fast, 15- to 25-minute charger; about 40 such chargers will be located in public places around the region, and the car's GPS navigation system will be able to direct you to the nearest one if you're running low on juice, Feldman said.

About a thousand 220-volt charging stations will be located in public areas, but it's not clear if they should be at park-and-ride lots or retail centers.

The 220-volt plug-in, something typically used for a clothes dryer or electric range, will charge the car in eight hours. People who buy the first 900 cars will get a free charger installed at their homes.

Questions aside, the appearance of the Leaf at the Qwest Field parking garage Wednesday brought out a gaggle of city and county officials and electric-car enthusiasts, who buzzed over the blue car with its "Zero Emission" sticker and no tail pipe.

The car has a solar panel on the spoiler to keep the radio and clock charged, and upholstery made of recycled pop bottles. "This is very cool, I just have to say," said Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels, who's is credited with paving the way for the infrastructure to be built in Seattle.

The Puget Sound area next year will become one of the nation's five key markets for the initial wave of Nissan electric cars, fueled by part of a $100 million federal Department of Energy economic-stimulus grant that will help fund a network of more than a thousand charging stations throughout the region.

With no tailpipe or emissions, it seems like electric cars would be good for the environment. But it depends on where the power used to charge the batteries comes from, said Clark Williams-Derry, research director of Sightline, a Seattle-based environmental think tank.

Sightline researchers recently took a close look at where the area's "marginal power" — the extra power above and beyond what is already used — comes from.

A study by the Northwest Power and Conservation Council showed that almost all "marginal power" in the Pacific Northwest is generated from natural gas, Williams-Derry said. Using natural gas to generate electricity for electric cars creates fewer greenhouse gases than using gasoline to power an internal-combustion engine.

That makes environmental groups like Sightline cautiously optimistic, Williams-Derry said.

Katherine Long: 206-464-2219 or klong@seattletimes.com