thankyouOB said:
An environmentalist by any other name is still and environmentalist.
You are an environmentalist if you bought a Leaf to save money on gasoline, or put in solar to stop wasting the sunlight that falls on your roof.
I disagree. Wanting to save money on gasoline doesn't directly imply that you are doing it for environmental reasons. It could simply mean that you can't afford gas anymore and have to find another way. Of course, you could argue that if your way of doing so is to buy a $35k vehicle, well then, that might be different. Spending a lot of money to save a little.... ok, there must be some other reason or you're just not good at finances...
Also, I've known people that have installed solar without regard for the environmental aspects. Financial reasons, by various rebate options making it a fairly decent ROI (in some cases, unfortunately not for our house), or to provide power backup in case of power outages (although there are other options that are better for that).
You can add me as another one that didn't buy the Leaf due to being an environmentalist. Granted, I do consider myself a bit of an environmentalist, but it's not why I bought the Leaf. I bought it because of the technology. I'm a geek, and have always been interested in electric <insert whatever here>. Add to that the driving characteristics that EVs have (smooth, quiet, high torque at all "rpms", low maintenance, etc) and it's an incredibly fun toy for me.
However, I do have to add that the only reason I was ALLOWED to get the Leaf "toy" was due to the fact that my boss (i.e. wife) IS very much an environmentalist. She likes it for the environmental aspects, I like it for the nerdy aspects. As time goes by, however, we're both seeing the other's point of view as well.