Nissan Qashqai EV could make appearance in Europe

First off, before we go any further, the Nissan crossover sold outside of the US that's nearly impossible to spell correctly is pronounced "KASH-kye." Now that we've gotten that out of the way, it looks like Nissan is considering making a battery-electric version of the Qashqai for the European market. So says, UK's Autocar, citing Guillaume Cartier, Nissan's head of European sales and marketing.

Cartier says the Japanese automaker won't consider an electric-drive version of the model "for now," implying that there may be one in the future for Europe. He added that economies of scale are driving battery-electric powertrain production costs down, so Nissan is likely to expand the battery-electric option well beyond models such as the Leaf. Nissan started making the Qashqai in 2007, with a second-generation version debuting three years later. The model is available in both five-seat and seven-seat options and is most similar, in size, to the Nissan Rogue.

Earlier this year, UK-based Severnvalley Motorsport started working on a project that involved equipping a retrofitted Qashqai with the Nissan GT-R drivetrain to provide up to 1,000 horsepower, which sounds like fun. Here's guessing the EV version would have somewhat less juice than that.