Superchargeable batteries "great leap forward"

"It's strange that they are talking about charging power but not charging experience."

"Suddenly, like a spring breeze overnight", the power battery industry is collectively accelerating towards the "ultra-fast charging" era. Suddenly, it seems that "thousands of pear trees are in bloom", and even lithium iron phosphate batteries are 4.5C.

Things become very magical.

For example, after launching the Shenxing super-charged battery last year, CATL (300750.SZ) once again launched the Shenxing PLUS battery at this Beijing Auto Show.

Both indicators are very strong. The battery life reaches 1,000 kilometers. At the same time, it can be charged for 10 minutes and has a battery life of 600 kilometers (the first 4C lithium iron phosphate battery).

Moreover, as the concept of " solid-state batteries " continues to gain momentum, mainstream power battery companies are also intensively releasing new 5C "super-fast charging" battery products. So, will the full deployment of 5C applications come so soon?

Is the hype about "5C fast charging" another "great leap forward" for battery companies? As one Weibo blogger said, "It's strange to hype about charging power but not charging experience."

01. So fast, are you ready?

In fact, in addition to CATL, during the Beijing Auto Show, Xinwangda (300207.SZ) also released a new flash charging battery 3.0, with a peak charging rate of 6C, which can be charged to 80% SOC in 10 minutes.

In addition, Ruipu Lanjun (00666.HK) has also released a breakthrough in the top-of-the-line supercharging system, which is said to be able to extend the range by 500 kilometers after charging in 10 minutes. EVE Energy (300014.SZ) is not to be outdone and has released the ultra-fast charging technology in the silicon-based era, which can extend the range by 500 kilometers after charging in 6 minutes.

Another company, the third largest, China New Energy Aviation (03931.HK), launched the latest model product in the "One-Stop Bettery" series ("OS product"), which mainly includes "top-stream" cylindrical batteries and OS lithium iron phosphate battery packs, with a maximum range of 1,000 kilometers.

"The 20 best-selling pure electric models in 2023 will have a driving range of 400 to 650 kilometers. One of our views is that moderate driving range plus supercharging, for example, charging to 80% in 10 minutes, can be used to address our range anxiety."

Regarding the role of supercharging, Deng Jie, general manager of Xinwangda's power battery system product line, said this at the recent 5th International Exchange Conference on New Energy Vehicles and Power Batteries (CIBF2024 Chongqing).

However, we still have to question whether the industry inside and outside is ready for the implementation of 5C fast charging?

First of all, industry insiders analyzed that 5C batteries are not yet "prepared for ordinary people". At this stage, 3C or 4C level batteries are still the mainstream. Why?

Because 5C is only suitable for large-sized battery packs in the short term, if the battery pack is small and has a capacity of only a few dozen degrees, a large part of the thermal management and cooling materials will be stuffed into it, which will not only increase the weight and cost of the battery, but also reduce the energy density, making it not very suitable for small and medium-sized cars.

The ideal 5C battery is currently only used in MEGA. 5C is accompanied by high costs and must be used with premium products. And the only ones that can bear the weight and cost of such batteries are usually high-end and luxury electric cars with large sizes.

Moreover, there are only 300 supercharging stations in China, each with a 5C pile that can only be used by MEGA. The rest are still 2C piles. The current limited consumer experience will not improve until 5,000 supercharging stations are fully deployed.

Weibo blogger "Zhang Kangkang KK" also said, "In 2022-2023, Xiaopeng will retreat from 4C to 3C, and Ideal will rush to 5C. The factory director has always been very stingy in product design, but this time he went straight to the maximum power.

As technology costs increase, can the user experience also use imagination to achieve an increase? This is the moment to test the king of product experience. If a major improvement in technology cannot bring about a major improvement in experience, then the factory manager will become a "technical person."

Secondly, can the power grid handle the load?

As the penetration rate of new energy vehicles increases rapidly, there is a huge demand for energy replenishment. The problem is that the change of high-power current will make the fluctuation amplitude of the power grid larger and larger, which will have a greater impact on the power grid and more severe load fluctuation.

In order to realize the beautiful vision of "charging for 10 minutes and driving for 600 kilometers", or "1 kilometer per second", in addition to supercharging piles, it is necessary to configure energy storage or build integrated photovoltaic storage and charging stations to balance the load fluctuations caused by super-fast charging models. This is also a problem for the increase in infrastructure costs.

Moreover, in actual scenarios, charging is difficult and slow, which is still a complaint of many consumers. Of course, this is also the starting point for battery companies to promote 5C batteries. Cui Dongshu, secretary general of the China Passenger Car Association, also said that the current charging infrastructure still has problems such as incomplete layout, unreasonable structure, old charging piles , backward technology, unbalanced services, and inadequate operation.

Secretary-General Cui and many industry experts are optimistic about "supercharging" (super fast charging ). According to data from the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers, in 2023, the production and sales of new energy vehicles will reach 9.587 million and 9.495 million respectively, up 35.8% and 37.9% year-on-year, respectively, with a market share of 31.6%. In 2024, it will obviously exceed 10 million vehicles.

However, with 10 million new energy vehicles added each year and the rapid development of super charging piles, the load capacity of the power grid may be the key. There may be no worries in the short term, but there are definitely concerns in the long term.

In addition, there are many problems in the construction of charging piles. For example, there are not many models in China that have 4C charging, only Xiaopeng, Avita, Polar Fox and other models, so the construction of 4C charging stations does not seem to be a very urgent "immediate matter", and 5C is even more advanced.

Moreover, there is currently a situation of charging pile diversion, and user experience also needs to be enhanced.

In the final analysis, the 5C super charging pile is a problem of diminishing marginal returns. In fact, if other infrastructure supporting issues are solved, 3C-4C may be enough.

At present, there is no safety verification brought about by large-scale application of 5C in vehicles and charging piles.

However, being too advanced in marketing is actually not a good thing for vehicle manufacturers and battery companies.

02. Marginal benefits of 5C

In addition, although ultra-fast charging has become the promotional signboard of various companies, there is a saying that "it is meaningless to talk about 5C or 4C fast charging without considering battery life."

After all, there are only two ways to increase the charging rate: high voltage and high current. Therefore, the current 800V high-voltage platform takes the approach of increasing the voltage.

For example, at a current of 250A, 800V can easily support 2C charging. When the voltage is doubled and the charging power remains unchanged, the charging current can be reduced and the wiring harness can be very thin, saving costs. The high-voltage route also supports faster charging for a longer time.

But this also brings up a problem. 20C and 30C are fine in the laboratory, but when it comes to actual car use scenarios, not all batteries can withstand such a high temperature.

Industry insiders said that an open secret in the industry is that currently almost all passenger car power batteries are set by manufacturers to allow the system to display a power level that is about 10% less than the actual situation.

Then, during the 1 to 3 years of battery use, this stored power will be slowly released to dynamically match the previous 90% power.

This will lead to the illusion that the battery is very good in the first three to five years, after which the batteries of many brands will deteriorate rapidly. Therefore, the OEM will repeat this cycle through personalized OTA after a few years to maintain the brand reputation.

The current 4C or even more radical 5C charging will make this "silent" OTA more frequent. For users, they may change their cars every five years or so, so they don't feel anything. However, in addition to the cost, the theoretical battery life cycle may be exhausted. What about the environmental protection and recycling?

Right. We can't just rush forward for the sake of immediate benefits.

In addition, according to Huawei's calculations, to achieve fast charging within 5 minutes, the charging pile power must evolve to 480kW and match the liquid-cooled supercharging station.

According to the "High Voltage Fast Charging Industry Development Report 2023-2025" released by Huawei, it is expected that by the end of 2026, the market share of models supporting high voltage fast charging will reach more than 13 million. However, in addition to models with high-voltage platform architecture, in the face of high heat dissipation requirements brought by high-power charging piles, the adaptation of liquid-cooled supercharging stations is also essential.