Will Leaf Prices Come Down by 2021?

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armmynissanleaf

Well-known member
Joined
Feb 5, 2014
Messages
98
GM has a huge 3-step formula to significantly lower the price of Bolt by 2021. They are actively working on this new battery, which will drop the price from current 12K to 6K per battery pack.

Do you know if Nissan is working on anything similar? What are Nissan's plans for 2020-2021? I am sure all automakers have big plans for th ecoming 5 years. Any ideas? And if they can lower the battery price significantly, will that mean lower Nissan Leaf price in 2021? At least that's GM's goal.
 
The answer is the same as for the question "will gas prices come down by 2021?": depends. Too many variables to predict.
If you had told me gas prices would be almost half what they were when I bought my Leaf over 6 years ago, I would have said "no way".
 
I don't think the list price will come down, but the incentives may grow, and the value you get for that price should also grow.

The cost of batteries coming down may show up more in the battery replacement prices.
 
DanCar said:
All manufacturers have the same plan. I heard it first from VW.
2011 Leafs are selling for $5K, so prices are always coming down.

That's also used and probably with a wonky battery by now, I'm assuming the OP means new pricing. The 2019 60kWh Leaf will cost more than the 2018 model and Nissan has already said as much. The Bolt is the car I would like to get, but it's way out of my price range and even if its MSRP were to drop another six grand, I still couldn't afford to buy a new one. GM is also close to reaching tax credit expiration territory, so there is that to think about as well.

All that said, every news source, Youtube video, article, etc. that I have seen, read, or heard has said that *supposedly* EVs will be cheaper than their ICE counterparts within the next several years. Me personally? I'll believe it when I see it and I simply do not see a manufacturer selling the EV version of their cars cheaper than the same ICE (assuming it's a model that comes in both mind you). I guess we'll have to wait and see.
 
It's not yet clear to me where the public's definition of "enough range" will settle. If around 200 miles then I suspect the prices will come down. If over 300 miles then the value may come in the form of extended range instead of price reduction. Likely, you will have "low and high" range options relative to the "enough range" value as it continues to inflate over the next decade.
 
Probably about the range that people expect from a gas powered car would be my guess. For an ICE with a 15 gallon tank that averages 25 mpg, that's 375 miles.

On a price point vs range basis, I would be very happy with a 2018 Leaf, but to entice most people out of their ICE cars, that's going to require the combination of a jump in gas prices (or a carbon tax, like we have in BC, Canada), a decline in EV prices (ie cheaper, better batteries), at least 250 miles of range in winter, and much better charging infrastructure. We're not there yet...

So, I think it's going to take another decade before 15% of cars are EVs, then another decade after that before 50% of cars are EVs. Hope I'm wrong though ;)
 
Federal & State rebates & incentives will give out in coming years. The battery price reduction will be offset by the conspicuous lack of EV rebate cash, so consumer end prices may not drop much, if at all.
 
Price per kwh comes down, helps all manufacturers. For now this has mainly let manufacturers buy more kwh to bring up range. At some point range will be "good enough", and then you'll see prices ultimately start to fall.
 
erco said:
Federal & State rebates & incentives will give out in coming years. The battery price reduction will be offset by the conspicuous lack of EV rebate cash, so consumer end prices may not drop much, if at all.

Count me as forecasting along similar lines. Would guess MRSP stays essentially unchanged with phase out of government incentives and battery price reduction manifested as increased manufacturer incentives leading to a nearly static nominal out the door price.

This would still be good news for the consumer as a few years of inflation makes the vehicle effectively lower priced.
 
LeftieBiker said:
I think that 2018 Leaf prices will fall quite a bit even before 2019. I wish I could wait.
Rumors of the 2019 Leaf+ like liquid battery cooling and 225+ mile range will help 2018 drop in value. Wonder if propilot will get improvement. See a general trend for EVs to favor the performance segment, like Ford Mach 1 SUV, so that should make things interesting.
 
Hi all,

Personally I think the prices of EV's will behave in a similar way as laptops and mobile phones.
You will get more range and power for your money but the cost tendency will be to slowly raise not to come down, possibly aligned with inflation.
At the end will be a better value for money as time passes as the same £30k will get you 200 or 250 miles by then and probably a charging period that if not shorter at least the same when compared to today's Leaf for a larger KW capacity.
Again comparing with mobiles/laptops a more power full battery will take longer to charge, this is pure physics.

Depending on which country you are charging, this will become more expensive as governments will want to maintain the same level of revenue (read as drivers legal robbery) as they have with ICE cars.
It will be a matter of being smarter and have some solar/wind own production on your property if you want to keep your running costs down but as we all know an EV will always be a lot cheaper to run that ICE's.
 
husoi said:
Personally I think the prices of EV's will behave in a similar way as laptops and mobile phones.
You will get more range and power for your money but the cost tendency will be to slowly raise not to come down, possibly aligned with inflation.

THIS...agreed.
 
husoi said:
Personally I think the prices of EV's will behave in a similar way as laptops and mobile phones. You will get more range and power for your money but the cost tendency will be to slowly raise not to come down, possibly aligned with inflation.
Your in the high end market for phones and laptops. Both have dropped considerably in price while improving in performance. Bought a $125 moto phone that works great and does everything I want it to do. Same with laptops. When they first came out they were $2K and crappy compared to today. Today $150 laptop does what many people need, which is to get on the internet.

E-cars will follow the same route. 10 years from now they will be cheaper than gas cars and most people will start ditching the gas car in that time frame. Battery technology is in its infancy. Lots of new battery technology on its way to mass manufacturing. Roadmap is solid for next two years of improvements. For example 811 NCM batteries coming in Q3.
https://cleantechnica.com/2018/03/04/exciting-developments-nmc-811-lithium-battery-technology/
 
I think what we need here is the next Model T, the next Volkswagen, the next Camry. Sure, the EV enthusiasts want a high performance, liquid cooled, long range EV. But what is truly going to make EV's catch on or not is IF they can become competitive economically with other car types.

The hard part is getting the two things to happen at the same time. You need lots of people wanting to buy the cars in order to make a lot of them and keep prices low and you need lots of low priced cars in order to get a lot of people to want to buy them.

I think the Tesla Model S and the Chevy Bolt are still both but far from becoming the next catch-on. Not that they are bad cars, just too expensive. The Leaf is closer, in my opinion, of doing this. No, it's not the best car out there, but it's about the most affordable and most available there is. Model-T's and air-cooled VW's weren't the best technology out there at the time, and were often ridiculed for it. But they sure beat everyone else when it came to sales due to the lower pricing.
 
My take is that EV's are on the same point of the cost/performance cars that PC's were in the 80's and 90's. Back then, PC prices were fairly constant but the performance was improving at a dramatic rate and anything more than a few years old was not very useful, since the software requirements were also increasing and trying to run new software on an old PC was painful or impossible.

My 2017 will still have all the utility I need (gets me around town for near $0 costs). So even if a 2021 Leaf has a 300 mile range and can charge at 100A or whatever, my car will still suit my needs. I don't expect used EV prices to drop as fast as used PC prices used to since they will keep more of their usefulness over time compared to a 1.0 mega-pixel camera or a 286-based PC.

The biggest opposing argument I can see is if someone needs more range or faster charging. If an EV is used as an around town car, that isn't a issue, at least for me or others in smaller metro areas. As long as there is a demand for short range, cheap cars that should support Leaf prices in the future.

Of course, if a miracle occurs and you can buy a 100kWh Leaf equivalent with unlimited battery life for $20k, that would change everything.
 
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