Enterprise Rent-A-Car (which actually owns three rental car agencies, Enterprise, Alamo and National) announced plans to buy 500 of the all-electric Nissan Leaf vehicles, as it prepares to offer electric-vehicles at select offices throughout its neighborhood network of more than 5,000 U.S. locations.

Enterprise Rent-A-Car initially will offer electric vehicles to customers across eight different markets where the infrastructure exists to support the vehicles, including Phoenix and Tucson, Ariz.; Knoxville and Nashville, Tenn.; San Diego; Los Angeles; Portland, Ore.; and Seattle.

Beginning this November, Enterprise will install charging stations at 100 different rental locations scattered throughout these eight cities, which offer hybrids and other environmentally-friendly rental options in 30 different markets.

The Nissan Leaf will go on sale in the United States next year, although Nissan has already begun taking orders, 17,000 by its own count, on the electric car and will start deliveries to those customers in December.

Prices for the 2011 Nissan Leaf will start at $32,780 but with a federal tax-credit prices will come in as low as $25,280, or for a lease payment of $349 a month.

The all-electric Leaf comes with a 107-hp electric-motor that runs on power supplied by lithium-ion cells. The laminated lithium-ion batteries provide the car with a 100 mile/160 km range on a full charge, with a top speed of 87 mph.