Nissan sees electric car sales hitting 1 million annually by 2022

Nissan Motor Co announced plans to sell 1 million electric vehicles (EVs) annually by 2022, a six-fold jump from what it sold last year, and said it had no plans to stop testing its self-driving cars on public roads, calling them safe.

Japan’s No.2 automaker and its rivals plan to step up development and production of electric cars in response to tightening emissions standards around the world, even as demand for such vehicles remains limited due to their high cost and limited charging infrastructure.

Launched as the world’s first mass-market all-battery EV in 2010, Nissan’s Leaf compact hatchback is the world’s best-selling EV, although sales have been just about 300,000 units in its lifetime.

The company now plans to focus its lower-emissions lineup on all-battery and gasoline-- hybrid EVs rather than costlier technologies.

Nissan said on Friday it would develop eight new all-battery EVs over the next five years, including four models for China. Its luxury Infiniti brand would begin carrying new electric models from 2021, it added.

Through 2022, vehicles powered by its e-Power gasoline-hybrid technology would likely comprise the majority of Nissan’s electric line-up, it said. Such vehicles use gasoline to power the car’s motor, requiring a much smaller battery than EVs and therefore being less expensive to produce.

“The heart of our strategy in terms of electrification is battery EVs and e-Power technology,” Nissan Chief Planning Officer Philippe Klein told reporters at a briefing.

Concerns about EV battery costs and components have prompted many automakers to develop a variety of lower emissions technologies, but Klein said that Nissan would largely forego plug-in hybrids and hydrogen fuel cell technologies, given their low cost-performance at the moment.