Nissan Electric Cars May Lose Range In Hot Climates

" Have Nissan Leafs in hot states suffered premature battery aging, or is the apparent loss in capacity down to a malfunction in the Leaf’s dashboard display?

" That’s been the question on the lips of Nissan Leaf owners worldwide after some owners in Phoenix, Arizona, began reporting that their cars had lost capacity bars.

Earlier this month, Andy Palmer, executive vice president of Nissan reportedly dismissed reports of early battery capacity loss as a faulty battery level display, but now an independent investigation, led by Leaf enthusiasts, has concluded that Leafs with lost dashboard capacity bars do indeed have a smaller range than when they were new.

The test, organized by Leaf owner and electric car advocate Tony Williams, took place over the past weekend in Phoenix, Arizona.

Using twelve different Nissan Leafs with varying amounts of battery capacity bar loss, Williams and his team of volunteers meticulously recorded each car’s state of charge versus distance travelled on a pre-planned route, using the popular third-party GID state of charge meter for added accuracy "

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