The "2022 Top Ten Technology Trends of China's Automobiles" (hereinafter referred to as "China's Top Ten Technological Trends") released by the Society of Automotive Engineers of China has aroused great concern in the industry, which not only points out the main technical development direction of the new year, but also becomes an important strategic support for leading the innovative development of China's automobile industry.
It is understood that from the grasp of the latest development trends of energy-saving and new energy vehicles, intelligence and networking, China's top ten technology trends of automobiles focus on "nine major areas", focusing on the three types of technologies of "achieving major breakthroughs", "achieving new mass production" and "significantly improving the scale of application" in 2022, and carrying out four rounds of research for enterprise chief technology officers, R&D backbones, experts and scholars, and finally forming research results that have reached industry consensus.
At the end of the year and the beginning of the year, this magazine specially planned the outlook report on the top ten technology trends of China's automobiles in 2022 to bring readers a detailed interpretation. These ten major technology trends reflect the continuous improvement of the technical level of new energy vehicles in China, the development trend of intelligent networked vehicle technology is ready to be developed, and the energy-saving vehicle technology is constantly breaking through.
Vehicle-grade computing chips above 100TOPS will be mass-produced and loaded
The large-power vehicle specification-level computing chip is the core component of the "brain" of highly autonomous vehicles. The level of intelligent networking of automobiles is constantly improving, the demand for computing power is becoming increasingly urgent, and the mass production of intelligent networked vehicles urgently needs "computing power" resources.
In 2022, the single-chip computing power of the vehicle-grade computing chip can exceed 100TOPS, and will be applied in the mass production of many models. At present, the autonomous vehicle specification chip has formed a batch application for the functional domain of ADAS/intelligent cockpit, and the large-power vehicle specification calculation chip (single-chip computing power >100TOPS) is being tested and tested.
It is expected that by 2022, a number of single-chip products with more than 100 TOPS products will be formed into mass production front-loading applications, further providing a computing power foundation for the mass production of high-level autonomous vehicles.
Not long ago, some media announced the 2022 new car auxiliary driving computing power ranking, Weilai ET7 and WM M7 are equipped with four NVIDIA Orin X, with 1016TOPS tied for the first place. The rapid development of domestic driver assistance chips has formed a challenge to foreign companies such as NVIDIA and Mobileye.
The third generation of semiconductor motor controllers will realize mass production applications in multi-vehicle enterprises
The motor controller of the third generation semiconductor is the key device to ensure that the electric drive system achieves high efficiency, high speed and high density.
Compared with the commonly used Si, SiC material has obvious advantages such as wide bandgap, high breakdown field strength, high thermal conductivity, and strong radiation resistance. Switching from Si-based devices to SiC-based devices can greatly reduce the size and weight of the controller, and the volume power density can reach more than 40kW/L, and the peak efficiency can reach more than 99%.
It is expected that in 2022, a number of vehicle companies will mass-produce the third-generation semiconductor motor controller, with a scale of 400,000 units.
At present, BYD Semiconductor is the world's first and only power semiconductor enterprise in China to realize the large-scale loading of SiC three-phase full-bridge modules in the motor drive controller of new energy vehicles. BYD Han's rear drive motor controller adopts SiC, which is an indispensable switching power device in the Han rear drive motor controller.
The improvement of safety technology has promoted the installation of 300Wh/kg high specific energy power batteries
High specific energy power battery is an important technical means to improve the mileage of electric vehicles, and the safety technology of the power battery system is the premise of the installation of high specific energy power battery.
In 2022, with the improvement of power battery system safety technology, 300Wh/kg power battery will take the lead in high-end models, 300Wh/kg battery and system products have completed technology development, active and passive integration of thermal safety protection, thermal runaway early fire detection and early warning device and suppression, fire extinguishing device and other technologies development and application, 300Wh/kg power battery will be installed in 2022.
Key domestic enterprises are Ningde Times, BYD Automobile, Guoxuan Hi-Tech; foreign enterprises are LG New Energy and SK.
Long-life fuel cell systems will enable multi-scenario applications for commercial vehicles
Using intelligent thermal management technology (including battery low temperature heating technology and vehicle integrated thermal management technology), the heating rate of the power battery system reaches 5-7 °C/min in a low temperature environment, and the energy attenuation of the system is ≤6% from -30 °C to 0 °C, and the vehicle can achieve 1C charging at an ambient temperature of -40 °C.
In 2022, the application of intelligent thermal management technology batteries will achieve normal use at an ambient temperature of -30 °C, and it is expected that more than 10 models will be installed, and the new model will be equipped with a rate of 5%.
At present, Huawei's intelligent vehicle thermal management solution (TMS), through innovative technologies such as integrated design of minimalist mechanisms, components, and thermal control integration, can reduce the working temperature of the heat pump from the industry's -10°C to -18°C under the premise of satisfying comfort, thereby increasing the battery life of the new source car by 20%.
Pure electric passenger car market share based on dedicated platform will exceed 65%
The pure electric special platform adopts the integrated design of power battery, body and chassis, which is conducive to the improvement of the comprehensive performance of the vehicle. Optimizing the space layout of the vehicle around the power battery, the suspension system of the flat floor, modular powertrain, and integrated electric drive system of the front and rear axles can optimize the user's driving comfort.
In 2021, major car companies have launched pure electric vehicles based on dedicated platforms, and have achieved good market results, including Geely SEA Haohan architecture, SAIC Zhiji iO platform, Changan C385 platform, BYD e3.0 and so on. Among them, Changan's first pure electric platform model C385 was released in August, with a planned production capacity of 30,000 units; Zhiji L7 is expected to achieve mass production in the first half of 2022. At present, the newly developed electric passenger cars in China have generally adopted a dedicated platform. In 2020, its market share exceeded 36%, and in 2021, it may steadily grow to 46%. With the more extensive application of independent brand car companies, its market share is expected to exceed 65% in 2022.
The dhet hybrid system is expected to be installed in a doubling capacity
Through the high-efficiency hybrid special engine and motor hybrid combination, the balance of ultra-high efficiency and ultra-low fuel consumption is achieved, and the fuel saving rate exceeds 35%, while improving the performance of smoothness and NVH.
In 2022, the increasingly stringent fuel consumption limits will prompt more car companies to develop DHT hybrid models, and the DHT hybrid system is expected to reach 1.5 million sets of installations.
At present, in addition to the "two fields" known for its hybrid technology, the mainstream independent brands Changan, Geely, Great Wall, BYD, Chery, GAC and other enterprises have successively released their own hybrid systems and installed them on some main models.
For example, Great Wall Motors' lemon-hybrid DHT has been installed in the newly launched Macchiato and other models. In addition, at this year's Chengdu Auto Show, Haval brand executives announced that in 2022, the main models of the Haval brand will be fully equipped with hybrid systems.
On October 31, Geely Automobile released the global power technology brand Raytheon Power, an important part of which is the intelligent hybrid platform Raytheon Engine Hi-X, which launched a hybrid engine including 1.5TD and 2.0TD, matching the SPECIAL transmission of DHT and DHT Pro hybrid.