Nissan unveils the new brand electric Nissan X-Trail, based on e-POWER technology. It is an electric car, or rather a hybrid car, which needs gasoline to power its battery.
It was thought that electric cars with a generator – like the BMW i3 REX or the all-new Audi RS Q e-Tron E2 – would go by the wayside. But that was without counting on Nissan and its e-POWER system, which arrived in Europe this year with the Qashqai. The Japanese manufacturer has just unveiled its new X-Trail SUV, the fourth generation. And unfortunately, this one still runs on gasoline while being electric.
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IMPOSSIBLE TO RECHARGE THE BATTERY WITHOUT GASOLINE
As the Automobile Propre website summarized it very well, the e-POWER system is an exotic hybrid architecture. Indeed, the new Nissan X-Trail is more of a hybrid than an electric car. The car can be called electric since the motors are electric and powered by a very small battery (1.8 kWh on the X-Trail). But this one is recharged by a petrol engine! Impossible to recharge it via a plug.
It’s possible since the Nissan Ariyra, the first “real” electric car in the range, has just arrived and didn’t leave us indifferent during our road test. What’s the point? Nissan emphasizes “the sensations of a 100% electric drive without the need to recharge”. Is this admitting that the manufacturer is behind on the 100% electric car?
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NISSAN OVERSHADOWS THE ELECTRIC CAR
It’s a pity to overshadow the 100% electric offer with this kind of hybrid system, which is not at all adapted to fight against global warming, under cover of ease of use, especially since the field is moving forward very quickly, for example, the announcement of an electric car with a range of 1,000 km for 2023, or the rapid recharge that will go to 10 minutes next year and 5 minutes in the years to come.
Nissan is also showing a bit of bad faith since one of the advantages of the electric car is precisely, in daily use, not need to fill up at the gas station. All you have to do is park your car (provided you have an outlet at home), plug it in, and go about your business.
- READ MORE: “Best Hybrid cars models & Future Hybrid cars models”
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NISSAN X-TRAIL: AN INTERESTING CROSSOVER THAT IS THIRSTY
It’s a shame because the new Nissan X-Trail is a really interesting vehicle. It is indeed a crossover capable of accommodating seven passengers in its cabin. Seven-seat electric cars are rare, especially because of the Tesla Model Y 7-seat version, which is overdue.
But as Nissan’s press release shows, the X-Trail requires between 5.8 and 6.7 liters of gasoline to travel 100 km, according to the WLTP combined cycle. So it’s not an electric car.
A plug-in hybrid X-Trail would have been better for the planet, with a real consumption of around 4.5 liters per 100 km, provided that it is recharged regularly. But Nissan doesn’t seem to like recharging, contrary to the European Union, which wants users of plug-in hybrids to go to the charging station more often before the hybrids are eventually lost.