Upgrading a 2015 Nissan Leaf S?

My 2015 Nissan Leaf S did not come equipped with fast charging. Thus on road-trips, anything over 300 km per day become quite painful as we had to spend half of our 10 hr duty time charging. Lets use our performance model developed from a previous post to see what upgrades make a difference in my road trip planning. Surprisingly, charging speed is much more important than increased battery capacity.

Recall from a previous post where we discussed a virtual road-trip, assuming ample charging opportunities, how far can we expect to go during a 10 hr duty day (see https://electriccaradventures.ca/2021/09/28/how-many-km-day-can-i-get-from-my-ev/). Lets start with a 24kWh 2015 Nissan Leaf charging at 1 kW from a household 110 V outlet. As you can see in the graph below, we manage a little over 150 km during our 10 hour duty day, most of it spent waiting for the car to charge. As we increase the charging speed to 6.6 kW (L2 charger) were now at 330 km, a 20 kW Chademo fast charger equates more than 500 km, and if somehow we managed 50 kW we would get almost 650 km.

Lets compare this to adding battery capacity, this would increase the car’s range, but with only the 6.6 kW onboard charger, we still spend a fair amount of time charging as opposed to driving. Do note, the Nissan leaf has over the years been available with the following battery pack sizes: 24 kWh, 30 kWh, 40 kWh and 62 kWh. But since this is all math, lets free ourselves from these constraints and consider pack sizes from 24 kWh all the way to 100 kWh.

Even if we had a 100 kWh battery pack the distance covered is actually slightly less than a hypothetical leaf with a 24 kWh battery pack which can charge at 50 kW.

Its important to note that EV’s sell on range. Thus you would most likely pay through the nose for that 100 kWh battery pack, but a 50 kW charge option on the 2018 Nissan leaf could apparently be had for mere $1590 USD (if this post is to be believed: https://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?t=25797).

So, I went shopping for a used 2018 Nissan Leaf, and my big criteria was ChaDemo fast charging ability up to at least 50 kW. At the moment (October 2021) autotrader.ca does have a few available in the greater Toronto area ranging from 20-30 000 CAD. I did find one for my family which we have taken all over the province, and even ventured into Quebec.

Truth be told, there are nowadays ample options for new and used EV’s. We will discuss a more thorough used and new EV survey in future posts. While the Nissan Leaf does indeed have its limits (say #rapidgate, or the somewhat orphaned Chademo fast charging standard), it is a more affordable option than either the Hyundai Kona or the Chevy Bolt (even with a handful of recent battery fires affecting the Kona and the Bolt).