Nissan’s new French office to house world’s largest grid-integrated energy hub

Nissan’s new regional office in France is all set to house the world’s largest grid-integrated electric vehicle (EV) system and second life battery storage unit in a building.

The new building will feature 100 vehicle-to-grid chargers, from Nissan’s partner ENEL, allowing Nissan’s range of EVs to plug in and draw down energy from the grid at off-peak periods with the ability to “sell back” the stored energy to the grid. It will also feature a 1 MWh energy storage system, from Nissan’s partner EATON, the battery storage experts, powered by 64 Nissan Leaf second life EV batteries combined with solar energy generation.

As the pioneers of the Nissan Leaf, the announcement marks an important step in the company’s plans to make its Intelligent Mobility vision a reality in Europe.

Making the announcement at the Geneva Motor Show, Paul Willcox, Chairman, Nissan Europe, said: “At Nissan, we’re going beyond product. Innovation is about more than creating something new. It’s about making something better and finding solutions for the future. Nissan’s electric vehicle batteries extend our expertise beyond production to finding new and innovative ways to store and transfer energy. By demonstrating that electric vehicles can play an integral part in the energy management systems of the future, this project is a watershed moment on our journey towards a fully electric future.”

The new technology is expected to slash energy costs at the new France office by reducing drawdown of energy during peak periods in favour of off-peak tariffs. The new energy management system will also decrease the amount of contracted power consumed from the local electricity supplier.

The company hopes to extend this innovative battery technology to other major Nissan sites and facilities around the world over the next few years. The systems which will be installed at Nissan’s new French office will serve as a live test case of what can be achieved when electric cars are used to their full potential. 

“Nissan has always been at the frontier of electric vehicle technology and we’re excited to be using our expertise to adopt a more sustainable approach to powering our business,” added Willcox.

Nissan announced plans to create a viable long-term solution to environmental protection in relation to energy use and storage at the COP21 climate conference in Paris last year. This included a partnership between Nissan and EATON on giving electric vehicle batteries a second life as stationary energy storage units and a partnership with ENEL on vehicle-to-grid integration. Grid integration trials have already begun in Denmark.