The release of the US EPA energy consumption ranking list has allowed Chinese consumers to see a new way of considering new energy models, and by comparing the three different working conditions test standards of EPA, WLTP and NEDC, it has also enlightened the future development of the mainland car market.
Wen 丨 wisdom driving network Jinshan
A few days ago, the US electric vehicle media InsideEVs released a latest list of EPA energy consumption of new energy vehicles in the United States, including models on sale as of early February 2022.
Hyundai IONIQ Electric topped the list with 253Wh/mi (157Wh/km), which consumes 253 watt-hours of electricity per mile (157 Wh/km).
It was followed by the Tesla Model 3 rear-drive version, which consumed 255Wh/mi (158Wh/km).
In third place is the Lucid Air Grand Touring launched by Lucid Motors, an electric vehicle startup known as "Tesla's biggest rival", with an energy consumption of 257Wh/mi (160Wh/km), while the Tesla Model 3 long-endurance four-wheel drive version is tied for third with the same energy consumption.
*Lucid Motors models
For Chinese consumers, this list has two points of interest:
The first is the way to calculate energy consumption "in terms of electricity consumed per mileage", which is rarely mentioned in the Chinese market.
Second, compared with the common NEDC working standards and WLTP working standards in the Chinese market, the EPA working conditions standard is still relatively unfamiliar.
In the Chinese auto market, when it comes to the endurance of new energy vehicles, it is measured by pure electric mileage, and the competition is who can run farther on the basis of limited battery capacity.
To measure the quality of an electric vehicle, in addition to whether it runs far enough, there is also an indicator that is equally important, that is, whether the energy consumption level is lower, that is, whether it is "power-saving" in layman's terms.
At present, electric vehicles have two main directions to improve their endurance:
One is to improve the energy density of the battery, through the increase of power in exchange for longer range of endurance;
The other is to reduce energy consumption and use the same amount of power to support longer ranges.
Most of the measurement methods used in the Chinese market are the first, and there is not enough attention to the second direction.
In fact, evaluating an electric vehicle in terms of energy consumption level is more rational than simply looking at the mileage. Because the increase in mileage is relatively simple, in terms of the current practice of most car companies, it can be achieved by increasing the size of the battery and increasing the battery capacity.
However, it is more complicated to achieve a low level of energy consumption, not only the electric drive system should be more power-efficient, but also the wind resistance coefficient and lightweight design of the whole vehicle are critical, which is a more systematic project.
Therefore, the simple mileage does not necessarily represent absolute advancement, and the low level of energy consumption must mean the advanced nature of comprehensive strength.
For example, the NIO ES8 has a cruising range of 580km, and its power battery capacity is 100kWh; the endurance of the entry-level version of the NIO ET5 is 550km, and its power battery capacity is 75kWh.
Judging from the mileage data, it is clear that the Weilai ES8 is dominant.
However, after calculation, it can be seen that the energy consumption level of THE NIO ES8 is 172.4Wh/km, and the starting version of THEIS ET5 is 136.3Wh/km, which is much better than the NIO ES8, and is significantly better than the 157Wh/km of the modern IONIQ Electric.
If measured by this data, NIO ET5 can even top the US EPA energy consumption list.
This actually gives us a lot of inspiration, that is, China, as the world's largest new energy vehicle market, should also introduce a more perfect evaluation method today.
The mileage allows us to intuitively consider how far electric vehicles can run, and if we can examine the energy consumption level more, let us understand how much electricity savings electric vehicles are, it will undoubtedly be more rational.
After all, the essence of new energy vehicles is energy saving and environmental protection, and the energy consumption level is the most in line with this original intention, which is conducive to the continuous improvement of new energy vehicles in the next stage.
As for the EPA working condition standard, it is the evaluation system adopted by the United States, and it is the same vehicle test standard recognized in the industry as the EU NEDC and the Japanese JC08 (only used in the Japanese market). In addition, there is also a WLTP service standard, the globally harmonized light vehicle test procedure.
In the Chinese car market, it is mainly implemented with reference to THE NEDC conditions, but some car companies will mark the data under the WLTP conditions, so everyone is familiar with these two standards.
NeDC's full name is "New European Driving Cycle", which means "New European Driving Cycle", and the main simulated environment for its mileage test is urban and suburban, accounting for 4:1 respectively.
The biggest feature of NEDC working conditions is that its test is basically a bench test, so the test environment is more idealized, and its data represents basically only a "theoretical value", which we can regard as the highest performance value that the vehicle can achieve.
Because of this, the NEDC working condition data is often quite different from the mileage data obtained from the actual car, and consumers mostly believe that its reference value is not high.
The full name of WLTP is "World LightVehicle Test Procedure", which means "World Light Vehicle Test Procedure", and its data is monitored from real road tests, which has high credibility and guiding value.
WLTP test covers 4 kinds of working conditions - low speed, medium speed, high speed and ultra-high speed, the average speed of the test is 46.5km/h, the maximum speed is 131.3km/h, while the ambient temperature, car quality, gear state, rolling resistance and load, acceleration and deceleration and other factors have been incorporated into the test system, so it is closer to the working conditions of the real car.
EPA is an abbreviation for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which shows that it is an official standard adopted in the United States.
In the EPA working condition test, pure electric vehicles express the energy consumption level by power consumption, and the test content includes urban road conditions, high-speed road conditions and power consumption under mixed road conditions, and also obtains important data such as mileage and energy consumption costs.
In general, the test of EPA working conditions is relatively more comprehensive, and there is no preset use scenario during the test, so it is closer to the real environment of the daily car, and its energy consumption data is more reliable.
The accepted view in the industry is that the EPA operating conditions standard is the most accurate, followed by WLTP and nedc. So should we repudiate THE NEDC and even immediately start replacing it with a new standard?
ZhiChaojun believes that different market status quo and consumption characteristics determine the choice of working conditions. The data measured under NEDC conditions is not untrustworthy, on the contrary, it is one of the globally recognized standards, and it also has irreplaceable value at the right stage of the development of the automobile market.
Especially in the early stage of the development of the new energy vehicle market, the performance gap between each model is large, and it is marked with optimal performance data, which is conducive to allowing consumers to intuitively understand the limit performance of new models and select similar products.
This is like the 100 km acceleration data that we talk about, in fact, it is also in a relatively perfect environment, with a relatively perfect driving method to obtain the data, the vast majority of people in the actual driving can not reach the calibrated acceleration performance, but this does not prevent us from us to consider the power performance of the model through this data.
From another point of view, in the embryonic period of the domestic new energy market in the past few years, there are many car companies that use 60km/h constant-speed cruising conditions to calibrate the mileage, which is not in line with the daily working conditions, and will soon be defined as "false data" by the consumer market.
In contrast, the NEDC working condition standard commonly used in the car market at this stage is one of the scientific standards recognized by the industry, and its existence is in line with the current situation of the mainland car market. In the process of continuous development in the future, we can also introduce newer and more scientific standards and methods in a timely manner according to the actual situation, so as to meet the new consumer demand.
However, China's new energy vehicle market is indeed developing rapidly, and consumers' acceptance of new technologies and new ecosystems is getting higher and higher, so they are more eager for more rational calibration methods. In this state of development, perhaps the day to replace the NEDC standard is indeed not far away.
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