Nissan Leaf/Venucia e30. 2010 to date (prod. 180,000 to June 2015). 5-door sedan. F/F, 24 kWh electric. Nissan gambles on all-electric cars being the future, with swoopy Leaf (C_d at 0,29, later falling to 0,28). Spacious and quiet, with good sat-nav, but cruising range still limited. Two plug-in charging set-ups, one with 3·6 kW, the other with 6·6 kW, which would take hours; an industrial quick-charge station (few and far between) would do it in 30 minutes. Far more accessible than the likes of the Tesla, and using lithium–ion batteries (delivering plenty of torque), but still suffered from range problems, with 100 miles quoted by Nissan at launch. No back-up petrol engine: the Leaf only has batteries. Eventually appeared with a slightly different grille in China as the Venucia e30 (a.k.a. Chenfeng), from 2014. Handled very much like a normal car.

Manufacturing locations: Oppama, Japan; Smyrna, Tennessee, USA; Sunderland, Tyne and Wear, England; Huadu, Guangzhou, China

Marque: Nissan