"Charging and replacing" two legs to break the situation "charging difficulties" Deputies and members of the two sessions focused on new energy vehicles "replenishment"

With the rapid rise in the ownership of new energy vehicles, new energy vehicle owners have encountered "various" energy replenishment anxieties. During the holiday, the high-speed "queue for four hours, charge for one hour" once made the electric vehicle be spit into "electric daddy"; the northern winter encountered extreme cold weather, the owner became a "charging slave", miserable; the old community could not install the charging pile, it was difficult to find the charging pile but found that there was a fault.

How to crack the "curse" of new energy vehicle replenishment? Recently, Lei Jun, deputy to the National People's Congress and founder of Xiaomi, and Li Shufu, deputy to the National People's Congress and chairman of Geely Holding Group, proposed solutions from the two paths of fast charging pile and substation. Lei Jun called for accelerating the construction of high-power fast charging infrastructure for new energy vehicles. Li Shufu proposed to increase the construction of electric vehicle replacement system.

Thanks to the fact that high-power fast-charging piles can greatly improve the charging speed and reduce charging time, high-power fast-charging piles have gradually become the focus of capital and enterprise investment layout.

"China Business Daily" reporter paid attention to the recent, charging pile company Trident said on the investor interactive platform, "In 2021, the special call will add about 34,000 fast charging piles and 11,000 slow charging piles." Since 2022, heavy players such as Ningde Times and Geely have invested heavily in the power exchange track.

What are the considerations behind the successive entry of heavyweighters? Wu Qi, executive director of the Wuxi Digital Economy Research Institute, pointed out in an interview that the power exchange mode and the charging mode can form an effective scene complementarity, so the main engine factory began to be optimistic about the power exchange track and entered the game with heavy money. Auto analyst Lin Xi pointed out that the power exchange mode is favored by the main engine factory, which is related to the price increase of new energy vehicle battery materials, and the use of the "vehicle-electricity separation" power exchange mode can reduce the cost of car purchase and is conducive to battery recycling.

Qi Haishen, president of Beijing Teyi Sunshine New Energy, believes that the "separation of vehicle and electricity" of new energy vehicles will become a new business development trend, and the market prospects of substations in the public sector are very good.

"Charging and replacing" two roads, breaking the game "charging difficulty"

On the occasion of the nearly first anniversary of Xiaomi's official announcement of the car, Lei Jun, a deputy to the National People's Congress and founder of Xiaomi, who shouted "fight for Xiaomi cars", recently announced the bill he submitted to the two sessions. For the automotive industry, Lei Jun suggested that "accelerate the construction of high-power fast charging infrastructure for new energy vehicles."

Lei Jun's investigation found that "at present, in the mainland public charging pile, the proportion of fast charging is only 40%, and the fast charging power is generally low, resulting in slow charging speed, long queuing time, low turnover efficiency and other problems are still prominent, it is difficult to meet the charging needs of the majority of users." ”

He proposed in the proposal, "Although the relevant departments are also introducing policies to guide the development of high-power fast charging piles, they are still facing problems such as imperfect top-level planning, high pressure on enterprise R&D investment, long construction cycle, and high economic costs." For example, at this stage, high-power fast charging piles are mainly independent construction of enterprises, and the construction layout, scale, technical indicators, etc. lack overall planning, and the level of interconnection is low. Enterprises are facing problems such as high cost of research and development of high-voltage platforms and immature industrial chains, and insufficient investment in research and development of high-power charging technologies. ”

In this regard, Lei Jun suggested that a new generation of high-power fast charging network planning plan be formulated, and key objectives such as construction scale, land use planning, and charging capacity should be clarified. At the same time, we will promote the formulation, unification and application of technical standards and communication protocols, formulate a three-year special action timetable, and give priority to promoting the interconnection of high-power fast-charging piles in the stock of scarce resources such as new investment and construction, core business districts and highways.

On the "difficulty of charging", Li Shufu proposed a solution from another path. He suggested that the construction of electric vehicle replacement system should be increased.

"In fact, the vehicle-to-electricity separation power exchange mode has the advantages of efficient energy replenishment and cost reduction compared with the traditional charging pile power supply mode." Among them, in terms of efficient energy replenishment, the passenger car only takes 1-5 minutes to change electricity, which has an absolute advantage compared with the traditional charging pile; in terms of cost reduction, the initial purchase cost of electric vehicles, the power battery accounts for about 40%, and the charging mode of vehicle and electricity integration makes the cost of the vehicle significantly higher, and the purchase price of electric vehicles can be reduced by up to half in the vehicle-to-electricity separation mode. Li Shufu pointed out in the bill.

However, in the entire life cycle link and ecological construction of vehicle-electricity separation, there are still some supporting policies and measures that need to be broken through. It is understood that in the relevant links of the construction and management of the substation, the substation is a heavy asset investment, the land is mostly leased, there are few land options, and there are many restrictions on land approval. In addition, limited by the versatility of cross-brand, multi-model, power exchange platform and device technology, power exchange battery pack communication protocol, electrical connector technology, etc., a replacement power station can only serve a single brand or even a single model, resulting in the increasing demand for station construction and the contradiction between limited land and power resources is further highlighted.

"The research and development direction and progress of various battery manufacturers are different, and the energy density, battery structure, size specifications and other aspects of power battery products cannot be unified, resulting in the difficulty of forming a scale effect in the power exchange mode." In Li Shufu's view, "the low degree of standardization of the replacement battery also restricts multiple brand models from sharing the same power station, which delays the development process of the replacement power station." ”

"The sustainable development of the power exchange model requires the cooperation of government authorities, industry associations and enterprises to jointly promote it." For promoting the construction of substations, Li Shufu suggested, "Accelerate the clarification of the relevant provisions on the construction of substations, high and low pressure box changes, land and construction approvals, and incorporate them into the national market management standard system." At the same time, we will further improve the relevant policies and regulations of the power exchange model, optimize the announcement regulations of the power exchange model, establish an exclusive announcement certification system for the power exchange model, and form a separate certification of the car and the battery under the separation of vehicle electricity. ”

"Accelerate the standardization and generalization of power exchange modes." Promote the standardization of the software and hardware protocol of the power exchange interface, preset 2-3 technically advanced interface forms to formulate recommended standards; promote the standardization of the battery pack, so that the battery pack can be truly interchanged between different car companies, different power stations, and different users. Li Shufu said.

"Swap Track" meets multiple heavyweighters

At this stage, charging piles are the mainstream way for new energy vehicles to replenish energy, but in the face of cracking the anxiety of new energy vehicles, the power replacement mode is also increasingly pinned on high hopes. In the past, the power exchange market, which was mainly dominated by Weilai and BAIC BJEV, ushered in a number of new players in the Ningde era and Geely this year.

On January 18, Times Electric Service, a wholly-owned subsidiary of CATL, released the overall solution of EVOGO, a power exchange service brand, and a combination of power exchange. The overall solution of this combination power exchange is composed of three major products: "power exchange block, quick change station and APP".

According to the Cataline Era, the chocolate power exchange block can be adapted to 80% of the pure electric platform developed by the world's 80% that have been listed and will be listed in the next 3 years, and can be applied to passenger cars and logistics vehicles from A00 class to B class and C class, breaking through the adaptation barrier between battery and model, and realizing the freedom of choice of power exchange models.

Zeng Yuqun, chairman of Ningde Times, said that if he wants to strive for 80,000-120,000 yuan, the market with a relatively low penetration rate of electric vehicles, the price of cars without batteries can be 70,000 yuan, the monthly battery rental cost is similar to the fuel cost, and the power replacement speed is similar to refueling.

6 days after the release of the power exchange brand of CATL Times, Geely, which has been planning for many years, entered the power exchange track. Geely and Lifan established a joint venture company, Chongqing Ruilan Automobile Technology Co., Ltd., and the two sides jointly invested 600 million yuan to vigorously lay out the power exchange market.

According to the planning of both parties, an efficient modular substation will be launched in the future, realizing a high-speed power exchange experience of only 60 seconds per vehicle, and can serve 1,000 trains per day at a single station. By 2025, Geely Automobile's ultra-fast power station will have 5,000 seats, covering 100 core cities and meeting the power exchange needs of 1 million vehicles.

In 2022, what are the reasons why the power exchange mode is favored? Lin Xie believes that the cost of batteries is an important reason for the main engine factory and power battery manufacturers to enter the power exchange track, "In the past year, the price of raw materials for new energy batteries has risen sharply, and the prices of new energy vehicles are rising." The cost of the battery in the whole vehicle accounts for up to 1/3 or more, in this case, the use of battery separation from the car, can not only reduce the burden of the car buyer, but also can be recycled for secondary use. ”

"'Power exchange + energy storage' can make up for the shortcomings of charging piles and is expected to become an important way for new energy vehicles to replenish energy." At present, China's new energy vehicle replenishment methods are mainly based on charging, but at present, the total number of charging piles and the ratio of vehicles to piles in China are still relatively low, and the regional distribution is seriously uneven, which restricts the energy replenishment efficiency of electric vehicles. At the same time, the form of charging pile-based energy replenishment still has difficulties such as charging time is too long, the efficiency is too low, and the requirements for land and power grid are too high, which has become an important factor restricting the popularity of new energy vehicles in the whole scene. The power exchange energy and the charging mode form an effective scene complementarity, so the main engine factory began to be optimistic about the power exchange track, and heavy money into the game. Wu Qi told reporters.

At this stage, the charging pile is still the mainstream choice for energy replenishment, but will the future replacement power station surpass the charging pile? CITIC Securities Research pointed out that "the rapid growth of new energy vehicle production and sales will give birth to the accelerated development of the charging and replacement industry, and it is expected that the domestic new energy vehicle supplementary market will still maintain a pattern of charging as the main and power replacement as a supplement in the next 5 years, but under the impetus of capital, main engine factories, policies, etc., the application and promotion of the power exchange model in some high-end passenger cars and operational vehicles will be significantly accelerated." ”