Europe is in love with the Renault Zoe, and it seems as though that relationship is just going to get better. The Zoe, for those of you who don’t live on the continent, is a compact EV that is as cute as a button and remarkably affordable.
The new 41 kW-h battery that the Zoe has been outfitted with has been given a NEDC range of 400 kilometers, which should translate to about 200 km of range in the wintertime, and around 300 km in the summer. The original Zoe had a NEDC range of 250 km, so clearly this new battery, dubbed the R90, offers drivers a clear advantage.
The Zoe is already the most popular car in Europe, and with this improvement to its range, people are only going to be more willing to take on an EV, and ditch their gas burner.
Renault-Nissan is making some brilliant marketing moves with the Zoe, and has figured out a way to knock the sticker-price down to an almost absurdly low level.
If you want to buy the Zoe, Renault-Nissan will give you the option to lease the battery. Of course you can lease the whole car as well, but the idea that you can buy a car and lease the battery is absolutely brilliant.
For this reason, people are able to buy an EV for less than 25,000 dollars, and still take advantage of all of the government incentives that they receive for the purchase of an EV.
The Zoe is also one of the easiest cars to charge-up. It doesn’t need much in the way of specialized charging equipment as it uses the Renault Chameleon charging system, which can plug into just about anything short of a Tesla Supercharger.
It takes about and hour and forty minutes to get to an 80% charge, which is a bit longer than it’s faster charging sister battery, the Q90 which takes a little over an hour. Of course the Q90 has a shorter range than the R90, and there you will find a choice to be made.
Overall the Zoe is the kind of car that is going to make an EV practical for the driving masses, and it is reassuring to the them selling in such quantities.
I don’t care a bit about the Zoe, but you seems to have missed Renault’s recent announcement about their medium and large commercial EVs (Electrical Vans, right?), the new Kangoo, and, a world’s first, a Master large EV. I bought a polluting diesel Master over a year ago, I want my money back!
Coincidence, the announcement during the Brussels auto fair happened just at the time Renault was being questioned for Volkswagen-like cheating about fuel consumption in their diesel cars. A diversion?