Is it difficult to get electric cars out of the city? The development of new energy vehicles requires "food and grass" first

A few days ago, Hualong.com-Auto Channel conducted an in-depth test drive of the Mercedes-Benz EQC, Mercedes-Benz’s representative product in the new energy vehicle market. The test drive route included daily urban roads, inner ring highways, and a round trip of more than 600 kilometers from the main city of Chongqing to Huangshui. kilometers of long-distance test drives. Judging from this test drive experience, although the development situation of the new energy vehicle industry is gratifying, there are also many problems. The most important thing is that the charging pile market for new energy vehicles is imperfect, which makes it difficult to charge new energy vehicles and get out of the city. As the saying goes, "before the troops are moved, food and grass go first." Considering the long-term development of the new energy vehicle industry, it is unavoidable to complete the layout of charging piles in advance.

It is difficult for new energy vehicles to drive out of the city. When can they really drive out of the city?

According to data from the China Electric Charging Infrastructure Promotion Alliance, as of June 2020, the total number of member units in the alliance has reported to the public There are 558,000 ***-type charging piles, including 324,000 AC charging piles, 234,000 DC charging piles, and 488 AC-DC integrated charging piles; as of June 2020, the cumulative number of charging infrastructure nationwide is 1.322 million.

Behind the growth in the number of charging piles, there are still some problems; to put it simply, new energy vehicles not only face problems such as difficulty in charging, but also difficulty in leaving the city. Compared with the main city, new energy vehicles going out of the city is the top priority that needs to be solved at the moment. During the test drive from Chongqing to Huangshui, many charging piles (State Grid) on the highway were in disrepair due to maintenance, causing the charging piles to be unable to charge; even if they were usable, their extremely slow charging times were simply not sufficient for new energy vehicles. "Renewal" when out of town.

On the Chongqing-Huangshui test drive route, in addition to the successful charging at the Fuling Service Area of ??Yinbai Expressway (in the direction of Yinchuan), which "took 17 minutes and the charging degree was 11.92 degrees", the test drive also took place in Shanghai and Chongqing. Neither the Lengshui Expressway Service Area (towards Shanghai) nor the Third Store Service Area of ??the Shanghai-Chongqing Expressway (towards Shanghai) successfully charged the test drive vehicle. For example, the actual experience at the service area of ??the third store of the Shanghai-Chongqing Expressway (in the direction of Shanghai) is not flattering. "It took 38 minutes and the charging degree was only 9.8 degrees." In the cold water service area of ??the Shanghai-Chongqing Expressway (in the direction of Shanghai), the three charging piles are also unable to achieve the charging effect. The charging time and degree are respectively "it takes 18 minutes to charge 0.88 kilowatt-hours of electricity, 21 minutes to charge 5.33 kilowatt-hours of electricity, and 23 minutes to charge." Charge 3.08 kWh."

Judging from this charging experience, the post-maintenance and maintenance of charging piles in most high-speed service areas (State Grid) are not in place at all. The problem reflected is: high-speed services where "every inch of land is precious" In addition to the active deployment of the State Grid, social capital should also play a huge role in the district. Only by establishing a complete network of charging piles can new energy vehicles safely leave the city.

To solve the charging problem, when will charging piles enter thousands of households

A few days ago, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, and the Ministry of Commerce jointly launched a campaign to bring new energy vehicles to the countryside; but new energy In addition to ensuring the quality of new energy vehicle products when bringing cars to the countryside, the supporting services must also be sloppy. Although the construction of charging piles in rural areas no longer faces the problem of "difficulty entering communities", if a large number of electric vehicles are used in towns and rural areas, the impact on the power grid during charging will become a problem that cannot be ignored, and the supporting power grid transformation also needs to be carried out as soon as possible. Put it on the agenda.

For example, after we arrived at the final destination of Huangshui Town in fear during this test drive, we found that there were no charging stations at all in the town, so we had no choice but to "borrow electricity" from the shops on the street. However, judging from actual experience, after more than 30 hours of charging at a street store in Huangshui Town, the test drive vehicle only charged 68%; and the Mercedes-Benz EQC we drove, if DC fast charging is used, it takes time to charge from 10% to 80%. It will not take more than 45 minutes, and it only takes 12 hours to fully charge with an ordinary 7kW AC. The problem reflected behind this is that when new energy vehicles are brought to the countryside, supporting services still need to be "first".

Of course, the same problems are not limited to towns and villages. Large-scale transformation is also needed in terms of parking spaces in old communities and the maximum load of supporting power grids.

For example, increasing the popularity of private charging piles to truly realize inductive charging of electric vehicles; on this basis, it is also possible to connect to the State Grid energy control system without transforming the community distribution network and ensuring residents' daily electricity consumption. , realizes intelligent control and intelligent dispatching, allowing car owners to enjoy the preferential price of trough electricity while sharing the excess load of the power station.

We cannot fight independently, and new energy development needs to break the "blind spots" in moving forward

It is undeniable that driven by policies, the full bloom of the new energy vehicle industry is the general trend; however, in While new energy vehicles relieve environmental and energy pressures, the inconvenience of new energy vehicles in people's use has also begun to appear. However, judging from this experience, charging convenience is still one of the important factors that troubles car owners when traveling and affects the rapid development of new energy vehicles. In the investigation, we found that the difficulty of charging pile construction, operation and maintenance, and poor interconnectivity are the main reasons for the difficulty of charging new energy vehicles. The crux of these reasons is that charging pile operating companies are fighting for their own success. coming situation.

According to data from the China Electric Charging Infrastructure Promotion Alliance, as of June 2020, there are 8 charging operating companies nationwide operating more than 10,000 charging piles: Te Laidian operates 161,000 Taiwan and Xingxing Charging operate 132,000 units, State Grid operates 88,000 units, cloud fast charging operates 44,000 units, Ewei Energy operates 25,000 units, SAIC Anyue operates 19,000 units, China Putian operates 14,000 units, and Shenzhen Automotive Network Operating 13,000 units, the remaining operators accounted for 11.2% of the total.

With everyone playing their own game, the situation of charging interfaces is mixed; in addition to our common Combo socket, Mennekes fast charging socket, CEE standard charging and other charging interfaces, some There are even charging piles for each car. In a sense, the inconsistent charging pile interface standards have become a major problem restricting the development of new energy vehicles. It is urgent for the country to introduce unified standards. Only by unifying the national charging pile interface standards can future charging equipment be truly market-oriented.

At the same time, the management service platforms of various charging infrastructure construction and operation units currently on the market have not yet achieved interconnection. The major operators are different, and the charging cards and charging standards used by each charging pile are also different; for charging piles of different operators, some require electricity cards, and some require WeChat payment; some use manual services, and some use self-service payment. It is difficult to achieve commonality between them. The lack of a unified, open and convenient payment platform also causes great inconvenience to charging infrastructure users.

On the other hand, the layout of charging pile facilities is still uneven. Data shows that charging demand is mainly concentrated in the city center. However, due to tight land and complex power grids in the city center, it is not easy for charging pile companies to find suitable locations to build charging piles. Although remote areas are cheap, the utilization rate after the charging piles are built is not high. For example, during the peak charging period, only 7 of the charging piles are in use, while 69 of the charging piles are directly idle. The idle rate of charging piles high. Moreover, most of the current charging facility companies have not found a sustainable and profitable business model. The only income of some charging stations is charging service fees; and some charging stations have low charging capacity, which also results in their later maintenance being not in place.

In order to solve the problem of “cars but no docks, and piles but no cars”, efforts still need to be made in the construction of charging facilities. For example, charging operation companies need to balance the layout of charging piles as much as possible and install charging piles in areas where car owners must pass and stay for a long time to effectively increase the usage rate of charging piles. At the same time, major charging operating companies can give full play to their resource advantages and "cast a wide net" in the field of charging piles; start by expanding community charging services and build a nationwide charging network to achieve a true "win-win situation" ".

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For most consumers, they think more about “buying a car with a stake” rather than “finding a stake after buying the car”; Chehe The piles are inseparable. Only when there are more and more charging piles on the market will people actively consider buying new energy vehicles.

We have to admit that charging piles have always been a "pain point" in the development of the new energy vehicle market. Later safety maintenance and operations require costs, which means that this industry needs strong financial support; therefore, the strength of major charging pile operating companies Strong alliance is undoubtedly the way to solve the dilemma of new energy vehicle charging. When the structural shortage of charging infrastructure, overall scale and other shortcomings are made up, it not only marks that the "last mile" of new energy vehicles has been cleared, but also marks that the development obstacles of the new energy vehicle industry have been cleared.

This article comes from the author of Autohome Chejiahao and does not represent the views and positions of Autohome.