New Leaf commercial is big improvement.

[davewill]

A LEAF could power my home for days* but the problem is it can't power my house AND be usable transportation at the same time. The two biggest items in my house are fridge and boiler. Fridge is let's say 33 watt-hours per hour (200 watts runs for 10 minutes out of every hour on average). Boiler may run for fifteen minutes out of every hour which is roughly 174 watt-hours per hour. Make it a nice round 200 Wh/h base loads. ...

The car could be driven somewhere where you could get a charge. Some people dealing with Sandy who didn't have power were able to drive to their office, or to another EV owner's house and get a charge.

 

[surfingslovak]

Another good one (courtesy of Seattle LEAF owner John Harris):

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAIktpb-zfc[/youtube]

 

[DaveinOlyWA]

A LEAF could power my home for days* but the problem is it can't power my house AND be usable transportation at the same time. The two biggest items in my house are fridge and boiler. Fridge is let's say 33 watt-hours per hour (200 watts runs for 10 minutes out of every hour on average). Boiler may run for fifteen minutes out of every hour which is roughly 174 watt-hours per hour. Make it a nice round 200 Wh/h base loads. ...

The car could be driven somewhere where you could get a charge. Some people dealing with Sandy who didn't have power were able to drive to their office, or to another EV owner's house and get a charge.

granted off topic here but Dave is point on.

electricity besides a dozen ways of making it (verses oil's one way) has a millions sources to get it from. even widespread destruction of the infrastructure will not stop electricity very long. sure there will be some places that will be out several weeks but at the same time, there were other places back online the next day and every day another thousand sources became available.

when the oil flow is disrupted, how many options are there? in most cases, there is none other than trucking it in from several hundred miles away which is what happened with Sandy. now did it happen in a day? nope... a week; for a few select places, yes. but that was to get it into the system. as we all know, the aftermath of that first trickle was just another source of frustration and delay.

What is making it worse is the gap between the capacity to provide the gasoline and the demand is shrinking every day and its no longer because consumption is going up. its because refineries are slowing down, breaking down, etc.

contrast that to electricity where new sources, green sources are starting to take a larger and larger role on the grid. There will come a time when no amount of money will increase the flow of oil. Whine all you want about the high cost of green power, but at least it can be bought and that will NEVER change

 

[RegGuheert]

Another good one (courtesy of Seattle LEAF owner John Harris):

Thanks! I like it! Just like a like the ones with Volt owners.

 

[Deleted member 3147]

Not mentioned yet is the possibility of being able to utilize your grid-tied PV during an outage. Since the Leaf would be supplying 120V/240V power, it could also be supplying the necessary voltage and phase signals for the PV inverter to engage and supply power to the isolated home grid. With the correct signals coming from a source independent of the Leaf and PV, excess PV production could be used to recharge the Leaf. Not saying that this would be particularly easy, but it seems all the major components would be in place for an alternative to a gasoline generator or no power at all.

Unfortunately, it isn't that easy. Most grid-tie inverters cannot throttle down the power produced and assume that there is a grid connected which can absorb all of the extra power. If you start up the inverter with a limited power source (generator, Leaf, etc.), the inverter will either be overloaded or underloaded and will shut down with a fault.

 

[tps]

Not mentioned yet is the possibility of being able to utilize your grid-tied PV during an outage. Since the Leaf would be supplying 120V/240V power, it could also be supplying the necessary voltage and phase signals for the PV inverter to engage and supply power to the isolated home grid. With the correct signals coming from a source independent of the Leaf and PV, excess PV production could be used to recharge the Leaf. Not saying that this would be particularly easy, but it seems all the major components would be in place for an alternative to a gasoline generator or no power at all.

Unfortunately, it isn't that easy. Most grid-tie inverters cannot throttle down the power produced and assume that there is a grid connected which can absorb all of the extra power. If you start up the inverter with a limited power source (generator, Leaf, etc.), the inverter will either be overloaded or underloaded and will shut down with a fault.

Yes. The idea is that the LEAF's battery would absorb the extra power during the day when the solar array is generating, and then release it during the night. Unfortunately, this would not be possible with most inverter hardware. Maybe with an Outback-style inverter and the V2H system you could get close. It might be nice if they could make it all work without a lot of extra expense, because you probably wouldn't want to cycle the LEAF's battery on a day-to-day basis, rather using the grid as the "infinite battery" normally and just run in off-grid mode for an emergency.

 

[exbauer]

I started seeing this commercial and really liking it. Better than the previous one.

 

[cwerdna]

I've been seeing a shortened version of the OP's ad on TV quite a bit lately. Just saw it on CNN.