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Nissan asks "why not?" build the Leaf-hauling City of St. Petersburg ship

In its latest spot to hit the airwaves, Japanese automaker Nissan zeroes in on the City of St. Petersburg – a 21,000-ton, vehicle-hauling ship with an unusually effective design.

Nissan's ad pitches the ship as a revolution in design, with its semispherical prow the focus of the breakthrough. Claimed to reduce wind resistance by up to 50 percent compared to a conventional vessel, the City of St. Petersburg's prow is expected to cut annual fuel consumption by 800 tons, which reduces CO2 emissions by 2,500 tons.

This revolutionary ship has room to haul up to 2,000 vehicles and has hit the waterways to transport cars and trucks to Northern Europe and Russia from the automaker's factories in the United Kingdom and Spain. In a fitting move, starting in 2013, the City of St. Petersburg will transport Nissan Leafs.

In the clip, Nissan's director of design, Taro Ueda, asks this rhetorical question: "Why would a car company make a ship?" To which Nissan's director of product planning, Mark Perry, responds, "Why not?" After all, the City of St. Petersburg fits in well with Nissan's drive to become the world's most efficient automaker. Hit the jump to check out Nissan's "Efficiency" clip.

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