Nissan Maple LEAF Blog

Received a phone call to day from Mike Poelzer, a Sales Manager with Morrey Infiniti Nissan of Coquitlam - Port Coquitlam. He was ready to quote on a purchase price, but because we had asked for lease pricing through the LEAF portal (there was only one option) he was still waiting on Nissan Canada for the interest rates and term lengths. He said he hoped to hear back from them in a day or so. I told Mike were were interested in looking over all available options for both lease, financed purchase and outright purchase. He said he would follow up with an email.

Happy email in the inbox today:

We have some exciting news. You can now request a quote* from your local Nissan Dealer and place an order for your Nissan LEAF™.

Delivery will take 3 - 4 months from when an order is placed. We appreciate your continued support of the Nissan LEAF™ and look forward to receiving your request for a quote soon.

While I wasn’t too thrilled about the 3 -4 months bit. However, I heard from Ricardo (mentioned previously) that that was just a hold over from the US ordering, that the Canadian “first forty” were moving more quickly. I’m planning for 3 months, and I’ll be pleasantly surprised if it’s sooner. Before the holiday season would be nice.

Here’s the screens for placing the order that I captured. I placed the order with Morrey Infinti Nissan of Coquitlam - Port Coquitlam.

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Thanks to my fellow Nissan Leaf “first forty” colleague Kelly (mentioned in a previous post) and the OK from my employer, I received an invitation to attend GE’s EV experience. Included seminars on the Business Case for EVs in corporate fleets and one more technically focused. I attended the technical forum (not that I understood), and thoroughly enjoyed it. In the afternoon, got to try two electric cars I hadn’t had a chance to drive previously. I’d like to have written longer reviews, but these are about how long I got to drive them - around the block at the Vancouver Fairmont Waterfront:

• The Chevy Volt - I wasn’t a fan of the interior, but I was a fan of the whiplash like acceleration.
• The Mitsubishi iMiev - The EV that, well, feels just like you’d expect an EV to… neat, but a bit too different.

Pics from the day including a re-appearance of the Canada Post EV:

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Not related to my LEAF order, but saw this EV in the wild. Just neat to see, foreshadowing of tomorrow’s post.

I also received my quote for the EVSE installation from AV - notification via email it was available through the LEAF portal.

It was slightly higher than I expected, but was in line with what I’d read on the online forums. One issue I did have is the “NEXT” button should read “YOU’RE STARTING TO ACCEPT!”, because I pressed it and it asked for my credit card info. When I went back to the home page, it showed a status of “QUOTE ACCEPTED.” At this point, I’m leaning toward opting out of the AV installation process, so I’m concerned. After an online note to the Nissan LEAF folks, here’s the response (its all good):

At this time since your account is not yet enabled to Request a Quote you will not be able to sign the waiver and proceed with ordering the vehicle. Once your account becomes RAQ enabled you will get an email letting you know, and you will be able to proceed with the waiver. At this time as long as you do not input payment information on the quote screen to proceed with charging dock installation you should not have to worry about AeroVironment. If you want extra peace of mind with it you can call AV, and just let them know you’ve decided not to proceed with the quote and they can notate that for you. Their phone number is 1-888-700-8034.

J-M and Matt from Big Green Island Transportation came by and conducted what was another straightforward assessment - seems our install is pretty straightforward. Had a chance to chat with them both, and these guys walk the talk when it comes to sustainability. Seems like a very entrepreneurial shop with an ambitious vision and a hands on approach. Very much enjoyed the conversation, particularly about the range of Electric Vehicle Supply Equipment (EVSE, often mislabeled the charger, which is actually in the care - this is just a smart plug really). There are a lot of options out there, but the ability to get them in Canada is limited - we’re a year behind the US for the Nissan Leaf and the Chevy Volt. In particular they’ll be looking into the GE Wattstation, the Blink, and the LEVITON Evr-Green products.

I suspect they run a lean shop, and they will come in with a comparable quote to AV - I’m eroding my negotiating position by saying “I hope so.”

Our order status in the customer portal changed this morning to “quote pending”:

I wouldn’t call it a milestone along the order journey, but we received a neat welcome package from Nissan Canada. Nifty presentation and some, well, cheeky stickers.

After I wrapped up with Dan from Mott Electric, I went online to tweet about it, and when I was looking for AeroVironment’s (AV’s) twitter handle, I went to their website. I didn’t realize that their other main business is to manufacture armed and unarmed unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs: think mini-predators). Check this article from The Economist linked off AV’s site.

While I support our Canadian troops in Afghanistan and think UAVs are a key tool in the asymmetric warfare out there, there are a few EVSE manufacturers to choose from. Like Nissan’s commitment to the EV, I want supplier who aligns with my values. So, I thought I’ll consider going out-of-the box for part of the LEAF order process.

During this time, I’d been having good conversations on FB with a friend we’d met at the Nissan LEAF test drive in May, Kelly, and another gent Ricardo, who were also part of the first 40. We’d setup an Canada Nissan LEAF Owners’s page on FB. There Kelly added a list of the EVSE units available and so I started to look over the options.

Problem is, although I’ve read that any electrician can do the install, don’t I want a company with experience? At least Mott Electric had done some installs. How would I order the equipment? How should I choose? That’s where a quick Google of “EVSE installers Vancouver BC” came up with Big Green Island Transportation:

Gave them a call, and ended up talking to JM, someone I’d met though the Vancouver Biodiesel Cooperative years ago. Great guy. Turns out BGI is like an insurance broker - they’ll come in and install EVSE equipment and are vendor agnostic. They can install a product and/or advise on selection. And importantly, they get it - they are committed to sustainability.

So, they’re booked to come out September 8th for a separate assessment. We’ll see where it goes, and I’m still waiting for my AV quote anyways.

Values alignment - check.

My home appointment was scheduled for between 1300hrs and 1700hrs. I received a call from AV’s contractor, about 1130hrs  that day confirming the appointment, and saying they expected to arrive between 1300 and 1500hrs.

Dan from Mott Electric GP, AV’s local contractor came up to do the assessment. He said that Mott Electric had done some EVSE installations down at the Port of Vancouver, and so they had experience.

The assessment was pretty straightforward, I asked some questions about other work I was thinking of doing down the road, and whether there was any savings to be had by doing it now (e.g., electric hot water tank wiring and inlet port/panel for a back-up generator). Didn’t seem as though there was any benefit to doing that work now.

As far as just the EVSE installation, I’m on the cusp of needing 200 amp service for the house (currently 100A) because I have an air-source heat pump, but Dan seemed to think that if I just add the charging dock now, there’s one open slot in my electrical panel and the location is good, so shouldn’t be too expensive.

Here’s some shots of the garage and panel location, where I intend to put the EVSE:

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I received a phone call from AeroVironment (I think), saying that they were hoping to move my assessment up from the afternoon of September 14th (the earliest slot the customer portal would let me choose) to the same time on September 1st. I gladly accepted.