The demand for public charging piles continues to increase, with a year-on-year increase of 67.0% in September

Data released by the China Electric Charging Infrastructure Promotion Alliance showed that as of September 2019, member units of the alliance had reported a total of 466,000 public charging piles, including 271,000 AC charging piles, 195,000 DC charging piles, and 549 integrated AC/DC charging piles.

In September 2019, the number of public charging piles increased by 10,000 compared with August 2019. From October 2018 to September 2019, the average monthly increase in public charging piles was about 15,000, and in September 2019, the year-on-year growth was 63.7%.

The function of a charging pile is similar to that of a gas pump in a gas station. It can be fixed on the ground or on a wall and installed in public buildings (public buildings, shopping malls, public parking lots, etc.) and residential parking lots or charging stations. It can charge various models of electric vehicles according to different voltage levels.

The input end of the charging pile is directly connected to the AC power grid, and the output end is equipped with a charging plug for charging electric vehicles. Charging piles generally provide two charging methods: conventional charging and fast charging. People can use a specific charging card to swipe the card on the human-computer interaction interface provided by the charging pile to perform corresponding charging methods, charging time, and cost data printing. The charging pile display can display data such as charging amount, cost, and charging time.

At present, the construction of public charging infrastructure is relatively concentrated in a relatively concentrated area. The public charging infrastructure built in the top ten provinces and cities, namely Jiangsu, Beijing, Guangdong, Shanghai, Shandong, Zhejiang, Anhui, Hebei, Hubei and Tianjin, accounts for 75.3%.

At the same time, the concentration of charging power in public charging infrastructure is also high. The national charging power is mainly concentrated in Guangdong, Jiangsu, Shaanxi, Sichuan, Fujian, Hubei, Zhejiang, Beijing, Shandong, Shanghai, Hunan, Henan, Shanxi, Anhui, Chongqing and other provinces. The power flow is mainly to buses, and passenger cars also have a large proportion. Other types of vehicles such as sanitation logistics vehicles and taxis account for a small proportion. In September 2019, the total charging power in the country was about 495 million kWh, an increase of 50 million kWh from the previous month.

From the perspective of operators, the concentration is also high. As of September 2019, there are 8 charging operators nationwide that operate more than 10,000 charging piles, namely: Teladian operates 138,000, Xingxing Charging operates 99,000, State Grid operates 88,000, Yunkuai Charging operates 26,000, Yiwi Energy operates 24,000, SAIC Anyue operates 18,000, China Putian operates 14,000, and Shenzhen Car Power Network operates 12,000. These 8 operators account for 89.7% of the total, and the remaining operators account for 10.3% of the total.

Although the number of charging piles is increasing, many users still face charging problems. Data shows that as of September 2019, the vehicle-pile information of about 962,600 vehicles was sampled through the member vehicle companies in the alliance, of which 313,400 vehicles were not equipped with charging facilities, and the overall non-equipment rate was 32.56%. The three factors of group users building piles on their own, the lack of cooperation from the property management at the place of residence, and the lack of fixed parking spaces at the place of residence are the main reasons for not installing charging facilities on the vehicles, accounting for 70.4%, and the remaining reasons account for 29.6%.

Cumulatively, in the first nine months of 2019, the increase in charging infrastructure was 307,000 units, a year-on-year increase of 38.2%, and public charging infrastructure and on-board charging facilities grew steadily. As of September 2019, the cumulative number of charging infrastructure nationwide was 1.115 million units, a year-on-year increase of 67.0%.