On the morning of January 17th, 2021, the Infrastructure Sub-Forum of the China Electric Vehicle 100-People Forum was opened in Beijing. Wang Binggang, head of the National New Energy Vehicle Innovation Engineering Expert Group, delivered a speech on the development of charging and swapping infrastructure.
Wang Binggang said that the first thing that needs to be done in the development of charging and swapping infrastructure is to summarize experiences, clarify thinking, and embrace the high-speed development of electric vehicles. China’s new energy vehicle development has achieved remarkable results, and infrastructure has played an important supportive role. In 2021, China’s new energy vehicles will enter a phase of rapid development, and infrastructure will face new opportunities and challenges. Summarizing experiences, organizing thinking, and making overall arrangements are very necessary. Among the many factors to consider in electric vehicle infrastructure construction, the four basic elements that I believe should be considered are safety, low-carbon, economic, and convenience.
Safety includes how to eliminate fires and active safety monitoring; economic considerations include low cost, low electricity cost, savings in land and construction costs, and the application of V2G technology, etc. The main aspect of convenience should be parking lot charging, while considering how to achieve fast charging at public charging stations and swapping for applicable situations. Low-carbonization includes energy conservation, green energy utilization, and peak shifting.
Secondly, charging infrastructure technology will continue towards diversification to meet the diversified needs of electric vehicles.
China has formed diversified infrastructure technologies and applications, including two major sectors (private and public), three types of properties (self-owned, public, and dedicated), and eight categories of charging and swapping scenarios. Various types of vehicles have significantly different requirements for infrastructure, and diversified technologies and business models should be developed based on demands, striving to achieve refinement, low cost, and high efficiency in each approach.
Thirdly, private electric vehicles mainly use parking lot slow charging, and public charging stations provide fast charging as auxiliary.
Statistics in recent years show that the matching rate of private electric vehicle charging piles in China has remained stable at around 68%, and most of the cars without charging piles are charged in unit parking lots, which is a basic situation and also a main situation in the future. Slow charging at parking lots has the advantages of not occupying additional land, convenient charging, and low investment, and has become the main charging method for private electric vehicles.
At present, there are fire risks and disorderly charging issues with parking lot charging that require high attention, and in the future, as the number of charging piles for parking lots will become increasingly large, how to improve its technology and management is worth considering. Several recommendations are proposed:
- Strict safety management should be implemented, especially for underground parking lots.
- Establish a win-win cooperation mechanism among power grid, charging operators and property companies.
- Charging parking facilities should be increased in residential areas, including tapping the potential of public places, to solve the problems of parking and charging.
- Focus on establishing a group control intelligent and orderly charging system in places where electric vehicles gather to achieve safe and orderly charging.
Fourthly, it is an important task for future charging infrastructure to vigorously develop group control orderly charging systems.
Group control orderly charging systems should include three aspects:1. Safety monitoring. Starting from before and during the charging process, the health of the electric vehicle is monitored through communication between the car and the charging network. It is determined whether it is suitable for charging and warnings or stopping of charging is given to vehicles with potential faults and risks to ensure charging safety.
- Orderly charging. It coordinates the relationship between the power grid and vehicles, ensuring normal operation of the community power grid, as well as reasonable arrangement of charging behavior based on user demand and power grid data.
- Further implementation of energy trading. To optimize the charging process, it plays a peak-shaving and valley-filling role. At the same time, green power can be purchased for electric vehicle charging, and energy trading between the car and grid can be conducted, known as V2G.
In establishing a group-controlled orderly charging system, third-party charging operators should be encouraged to participate in construction and operation.
Fifth, public areas should reasonably layout charging and swapping facilities based on different vehicle needs.
Most cities have formulated plans for electrification of public vehicles, and there are differences in charging and swapping methods for government vehicles, ride-hailing vehicles, taxis, buses, logistics vehicles, etc., as well as differences between cities. Suitable methods should be considered based on the running characteristics of the vehicles, such as slow charging, fast charging, rapid battery swapping, high-power charging and on-line charging, like the “dual-source, non-rail” in Beijing. The design of public area vehicles should be combined with charging and swapping methods to achieve the best economy and efficiency.
In addition, more public area vehicles charge and swap during the day, so coordination with the power grid should be highly valued to avoid impacts on the local power grid. Therefore, we must develop intelligent green energy management systems.
Sixth, promote the use of battery swapping technology in suitable scenarios.
By the end of 2019, there were 306 battery swapping stations nationwide. By July 2020, this had increased to 452, with ADM Energy having 222 stations, accounting for about 50%, and NIO and BETTERY having 141 and 94 stations respectively. Therefore, the development of battery swapping stations has received great attention, and has also received clear support from government departments. It is therefore very important to consider how to promote battery swapping technology.
Quick battery swapping technology is very suitable for operating vehicles with long working hours, such as taxis, ride-hailing vehicles, logistics vehicles, and dedicated vehicles in large cities. ADM Energy’s innovative 20-second quick-swapping technology has already been applied to electric taxis. NIO’s application of battery swapping technology to private cars has created an “battery bank model,” an innovative sales and service model for high-end electric vehicles. Therefore, the development of battery swapping mode needs to be based on the actual situation. At the same time, if we want to promote it on a large scale, we must solve the problem of standardization, such as achieving shared use and reducing land occupation.
Seventh, suitable application areas for high-power charging technology.
Everyone is accelerating the development of high-power charging technology. The main application areas of high-power charging technology are as follows:1. For private electric cars that need to go to public charging stations for various reasons, such as going on a long trip, discovering a lack of electricity temporarily, or if there are no parking spaces with charging conditions.
- Operating vehicles with long daily mileage, such as taxis, tourism, logistics, and ride-hailing services.
- Certain public buses.
Therefore, in the design of high-end passenger cars in the future, they should have both fast and slow charging interfaces, which are suitable for being able to do both fast and slow charging. Wang Binggang also stated that the application of high-power charging technology does not mean that electric vehicle energy supply needs to return to the traditional refueling station method of conventional vehicles.
Eighth, meet the needs of small cars with small power AC charging sockets.
In recent years, with the popularity of electric vehicles in small and medium-sized cities and rural areas, low-power and low-cost charging sockets have been widely used. They have the advantages of low cost and easy installation. With the popularity of small electric vehicles, these sockets will be widely used. Therefore, in order to ensure the safety of such socket charging, relevant standards need to be developed and strictly implemented. At the same time, unsafe and makeshift “fly-line charging” must be strictly prohibited in management.
Ninth, develop V2G technology to achieve mutual benefit of cars and electricity.
The practical significance of developing V2G technology can be seen from three aspects:
For electric vehicle users, they can charge their vehicles during times of low electricity price, and sell the energy stored in electric vehicles to power companies during times of high electricity price, which can provide cash subsidies and reduce the cost of using electric vehicles.
For power grid companies, V2G technology can not only reduce the pressure on power consumption caused by the large-scale development of electric vehicles but also use electric vehicles as energy storage devices to regulate load, improve grid efficiency and reliability, and reduce investment in energy storage construction.
For automotive companies, V2G technology reduces the cost of using electric vehicles for users, thereby promoting the production and sales of electric vehicles, which benefits automotive companies as well.
In scenarios such as natural disasters, electric vehicles with power output capabilities can also be used as emergency power sources, which increases the utility of electric vehicles. I believe this will bring many benefits to the functions and sales of electric vehicles.
Tenth, achieve low-carbon goals through vehicle-network collaboration.The essence of charging infrastructure is the interface between the power grid and the vehicles. Traditional gasoline-powered vehicles and fuel cell vehicles require the construction of a complete system, including energy collection, processing, and transportation for refueling. However, the energy for electric vehicles comes directly from the power grid, which is the most complete and widely used energy supply system. Therefore, the charging infrastructure for electric vehicles only needs to transmit electricity from the grid to the vehicle, which is of great importance. The essence of charging infrastructure is the interface between the power grid and the vehicles. To fully utilize the power grid’s capabilities to achieve vehicle-electricity integration, the investment should be kept minimal to achieve the best results and to support large-scale promotion of electric vehicles. Furthermore, it is important to avoid guiding the construction of public charging stations for electric vehicles in a traditional gasoline refueling station layout.
To promote the coordination between vehicles and the power grid, it is crucial to vigorously promote intelligent and orderly charging, as well as the utilization of renewable energy such as photovoltaic power, wind power, and hydroelectric power through technologies like V2G (Vehicle-to-Grid) and microgrids. This will lead to the greening of electric vehicle energy and contribute to the national goal of carbon neutrality.
This article is a translation by ChatGPT of a Chinese report from 42HOW. If you have any questions about it, please email bd@42how.com.