How can new energy vehicles achieve a charging experience similar to refueling?

The transformation of the century-old automobile industry is accelerating. In the process of accelerating the electrification transformation of automobiles, improving the consumer experience is the key. From the market feedback, even if new energy vehicles enter the market-driven mode, the pain points of consumers' charging anxiety and safety concerns still exist, affecting consumers' car experience.

From the perspective of the main factors that influence users to buy electric vehicles, charging and battery issues are the most important. 80% of users are concerned about the convenience of charging, which is mainly reflected in slow charging, uneven distribution of charging piles, and mismatch between cars and piles. How should the existing charging problems be solved? Can the existing technology and market support the implementation of this method? How to support the stable development of the industry after implementation?

To solve the charging problem, high-voltage fast charging is the best solution

Regarding these pain points, Lai Zhenhua, an expert at Beijing Benz, pointed out, "It is not simply about mileage anxiety, but a comprehensive concern about the ratio of energy supply and energy consumption. The time for energy supply includes the actual time spent by customers in the process of searching, waiting and actually charging. Simply increasing the driving range is to increase and improve the time of energy consumption at a relatively high cost."

To truly improve the efficiency of energy replenishment, solving the problem from the charging aspect is the key. From the perspective of industry development trends, to solve the charging problem, the industry needs to evolve towards high-power fast charging. In recent years, the charging rate of batteries has been increasing, and the demand for single-gun charging power has also been further increased. The corresponding single-gun charging power has also evolved from the original 10KW to the current single-gun charging 60KW, and the future 500KW. The charging power has been constantly evolving.

At present, the high-power fast charging technology routes in the industry mainly include low-voltage, high-current fast charging represented by Tesla, and high-voltage fast charging technology represented by European car companies such as Porsche Taycan. No matter which technology route is chosen, the final choice is either high-voltage or high-current technology.

Regarding the choice of technical route, Wang Chao, President of Huawei's Intelligent Electric Vehicle Field, said, "To improve the ultimate fast charging experience, the charging rate will go from 2C to 4C and then to 6C, and eventually it will go to high voltage and high current. This is the only way we have to go in the process of pursuing the charging experience. It's nothing more than a process of choosing high current first and then high voltage, or high voltage first and then high current."

Although the two technical paths will lead to the same end, due to differences in industrial development, there is already a situation where vehicles that require high-voltage charging cannot be charged on current low-voltage charging piles. Therefore, from the perspective of charging infrastructure, high voltage is the technical route that can best protect existing investments.

High voltage can meet the future compatibility of low-voltage and high-voltage vehicles, which can quickly promote the development of the industry and support the charging path of charging rates from 2C to 4C to 6C in the future. This can also better and maximize the protection of the initial investment of charging pile companies and charging operators. In the future, large-scale transformation will no longer be required. Through modular expansion, infrastructure investment can be protected to the greatest extent, and the development of high-voltage and fast charging can be jointly promoted.

It is worth mentioning that in order to adapt to the development of the industry, Huawei launched the HiCharger DC fast charging module to support a wide voltage charging solution (200V-1000V), which is suitable for the fast charging requirements of all platforms and all models. It has been installed on charging piles of many manufacturers such as State Grid, Star Charging, and Teld.

Wang Lei, co-founder of Star Charging, said, "Since the second half of 2018, Star Charging's DC charging piles have stopped investing in low-voltage charging piles. We hope to redefine the charging network with partners and users and realize industrial interconnection."

The time for high-voltage fast charging has come, and the car and charging piles need to work together

Whether from the perspective of industry development trends or technological maturity, charging piles are easier to achieve high voltage than cars. When upgrading charging piles to high voltage, other equipment does not need to be re-selected except for the charging gun, wire, and direct fuse. If the car side wants to go the high voltage route, it means that the core three-electric system, air conditioning compressor, OBC (on-board charger) and other components must work normally in a high voltage environment.

From a technical perspective, the high-voltage technology of core components is basically available. The current mainstream power battery pack can support a 2C charging rate. Charging at a higher rate requires higher-precision BMS technology support. From Huawei's new product launch conference, AI BMS technology has higher accuracy, optimizes battery charging efficiency, and can provide early fault warning to ensure battery safety. In terms of motor drive systems, BorgWarner, Huichuan Technology, etc. have launched 800V electric drive systems; Huawei has also launched a full-stack high-voltage solution for AI flash charging power domain, which can be flexibly selected according to the actual needs of car companies.

From a market perspective, the impact of models equipped with high-voltage components on the costs of automakers is controllable. At present, high-voltage platforms are mainly concentrated in high-end models, such as Porsche's Taycan and the recently released BAIC Polar Fox series. In 2025, other systems can basically reach a flat level, but the cost of the battery system is estimated to still increase by about 5%. For the whole vehicle, the actual cost will increase by about 2%; however, when the layout of super charging piles is improved, the range can be truly solved, and this part of the rising cost can be reduced by reducing the battery pack, and the overall cost increase is within a controllable range.

When electric vehicles also achieve high voltage, it will further accelerate the upgrade of the charging network, improve the charging experience, and achieve a closed business loop. According to Huawei's Wang Chao's prediction, from the perspective of global high-voltage charging vehicle planning, in 2025, global automakers will intensively launch high-voltage models, and a total of about 3.93 million high-voltage electric vehicles will be put on the ground. With the landing of high-voltage vehicles, the current domestic and overseas super charging networks are further accelerating. The domestic 150KW charging piles currently have a coverage rate of only about 5%. It is predicted that by the end of 2022, with the gradual improvement of State Grid, Southern Grid, Xingxing, and Teld, the proportion of domestic high-voltage charging will be able to increase to more than 90%.

However, the key to promoting the commercial closed loop of the high-voltage fast charging industry is to solve the problem of the development rhythm of the car charging pile: car companies do not fully grasp the layout route and timing of high-voltage charging, and are cautious about the planning and launch of high-voltage models; and charging pile operators do not have a good way to predict the route and vehicle scale of future electric vehicles, so the layout of high-voltage charging piles will be very passive. In addition, the current business model of charging operators cannot make profits from charging services, and can only rely on other businesses to make up for the losses of charging business has not improved.

In this regard, Gao Xiang, deputy director of the China Electric Vehicle 100 Research Institute, pointed out that "the new technology iteration process requires the coordination of the entire supply chain, and even the coordination of the energy industry. Only by working together to improve the high-voltage fast charging industry chain can the entire industry chain be mature, cost-controlled, and able to stably support the application of technology."

In other words, to promote the development of the high-voltage fast-charging industry, it is necessary to form an open and cooperative ecosystem among car companies, charging pile companies, high-voltage system suppliers and industry think tanks, and coordinate the pace of each link. Through the ecosystem, the value chain in the industrial chain can be integrated to smoothly change the current business model.