Source of this article: Times Finance Author: He Qing
At 1:40 a.m. on the 28th, Duan He finally arrived at his home in Beijing, "I arrived home safely, and I thank the electric car for not throwing me on the road." ”
Just over 1 hour ago, the Xpeng P7 he drove to a range of only 47 kilometers, and finally arrived at the Baoding charging station to successfully charge, which is the last charge of Duan Hekai's 3,950-kilometer round-trip journey of the Spring Festival. On the way to and from, he charged 13 times, and many times faced the dilemma of only tens of kilometers of endurance and almost lying down.
This Spring Festival, Duan He chose to drive an electric car back to his hometown, with the hope of "not encountering big traffic jams and nests", from Beijing to Guizhou, passing through Shijiazhuang, Xuchang, Xiangyang, Jingzhou, Changde and other places, the outbound journey was 26.5 hours, and the return journey was 29.2 hours. From north to south, Duan He experienced "Spring Festival characteristics" scenes such as low temperature, long-distance and concentrated travel.
Similar to him, the owner of the electric car, Xia Tuo, embarked on the road to the Spring Festival with mileage anxiety. "Fortunately, I didn't encounter a big traffic jam, but unfortunately, I was inexperienced the first time, and I waited in line for three hours in the high-speed charging queue." Xia Tuo sighed: "The New Year high-speed charging queue is really not covered!" ”
The two stories of Duan He and Xia Tuo are typical of the Spring Festival of electric car owners. "There are quite a few people driving electric cars home." Duan He told Times Finance. This year's Spring Festival, driving an electric car back to the hometown and returning trip, whether there will be power outages "nests", service area queues for charging, charging piles are difficult to find, etc., still become a hot topic of people's attention.
Duan He was on his way home at high speed. Image source: Photo by Duan He
Turn off the air conditioner, find piles at high speed, and prevent lying nests into basic exercises
"I feel that this is the most congested Spring Festival return trip in history, and I once ran until I had only 35 kilometers left." Duan He told Times Finance.
On the fifth day of the Lunar New Year, Duan He returned to Beijing from Guizhou. On the second day of departure, Duan He spent a morning on the Xuguang Expressway. "After crossing Pingding Mountain, I decisively changed to Xuchang's national highway and county road, and there were not many cars. Originally prepared to go to Xuchang city to charge, looking at the weather is okay, turned off the air conditioner and drove directly to the charging pile of Zhengzhou Airport, and when the charging pile was found, the battery life was only 35 kilometers left. Duan He said.
This is the first time that Duan He has driven an electric car to experience the long distance of the Spring Festival. In fact, before departure, Duan He made full preparations, reasonably arranged the charging planning mileage, and preset some of the more serious consequences. "The previous trip was planned to have charging piles between 200 kilometers, and the return trip was bold, basically charging piles were planned between 300 kilometers."
"Turn on the air conditioner in advance, and the energy consumption will not be so high at the beginning." "If the weather is nice, turn off the air conditioning." "The closer to the south, the higher the temperature and the lower the energy consumption." "Do not charge in the service area, if the charging pile in the service area is lined up, it is really not as follows to find the charging pile at high speed." "If there is a serious traffic jam ahead and the vehicle's battery is less than 40%, you can choose to recharge before the traffic jam." Duan He shared his own experience, turning off the air conditioner to reduce energy consumption, resolutely replenishing energy at high speed under traffic jams..., a set of operations to flow clouds and water. In the comment area of his social platform, many netizens also shared their Spring Festival experience: "Run when the temperature is high during the day, don't turn on the air conditioner." "Sometimes you can get off the high speed." Turning off the air conditioner, getting off the highway, and finding piles have become skilled operations among tram owners.
"Thanks to adequate planning and judgment, the round trip of nearly 4,000 kilometers was generally quite smooth." Duan He told Times Finance.
However, Duan He said that in the supercharging service area, he encountered two fully charged cars occupying charging piles. "A full charge should be moved in time, and the Spring Festival charging is frequent, and you can't just make it convenient for yourself."
"There was also an unpleasant charging experience, the first night of the return trip was ready to set off on a full charge, and I found a third-party charging station in my hometown, but I tried five guns and it was not good, I was very irritable, and I felt that the third-party operation still needed to work hard." Duan He said.
When Duan He returned home, he passed through Huaihua. Image source: Photo by Duan He
Queue for three hours to charge
"The New Year high-speed charging queue is really not covered." Speaking of the return trip of the Spring Festival, Xia Tuo, the owner of the electric car, told Times Finance with deep feelings.
"The first time I had no experience, when I passed the charging pile on the Rongwu Expressway on the return trip of the Spring Festival, three overcharges, eight cars lined up, thinking that it would take about an hour and a half to queue. As a result, an hour and a half passed, and there were still three cars in front of me, but I had been waiting for a long time and thought that it should be almost there, so let's queue up for a while. It was another hour and a half, three hours to get in line! Xia Xia shared his journey of entanglement. In fact, less than twenty minutes to drive near the highway, there is a State Grid overcharge, and there was also a chance to get off the highway at that time, thinking that everything was waiting, and then wait. Now that I have experience, I will definitely not wait forever next time. Xia Tuo said.
Xia told Times Finance that she returned to Beijing from Weifang on the fifth day of the Lunar New Year (January 26), and although there was no traffic jam on the highway, she still had mileage anxiety, mainly worried about the need to queue for charging and slow charging. Xia Tuo introduced that her car has a cruising range of 510 kilometers when fully charged; The one-way journey from Weifang to Beijing is about 520 kilometers, and it takes about 6.5 hours without charging.
Xia Tuo's concern was not unreasonable. She introduced that although there was no traffic jam on the highway, there was no queuing when she got off the highway and then charged on the way. However, the high-speed charging pile does need to queue, and the return trip is queued at the high-speed charging pile for three hours. "And outdoor charging is so slow in winter, indoor charging in urban areas only takes half an hour, and outdoor charging takes more than an hour." Xia Tuo complained.
Another netizen claiming to be the owner of an electric car shared his high-speed charging queue on social platforms. "On the fourth day of the Lunar New Year, from Jiangsu to Shenzhen, the charging piles in each service area need to wait, platoon, and even grab. Because someone grabbed or added a plug, I saw at least three groups of people on the way to quarrel because of the pile. She said that the longest charge, plus the queue, took more than two hours.
What is the solution to the anxiety about the range of electric vehicles during the holidays?
In the eyes of the industry, during long holidays such as Spring Festival and National Day, the long-distance endurance and charging problems encountered by electric vehicles still need to be further improved and solved. In particular, the peak of the Spring Festival traffic flow, coupled with the impact of low temperature, further tests the charging and replenishment facilities of the highway network. According to titanium media reports, the failure rate of charging piles in most high-speed service areas before the Spring Festival is about 25%, and there are still many power shortages that cannot support the fast charging function.
According to the "Monitoring Report on Charging Infrastructure in Major Cities in China" released by the China Academy of Urban Planning and Design in June 2022, the demand for peak charging on holidays along the intercity expressway is strong, and the proportion of passenger cars has increased significantly. Taking the 66 charging stations along the Shanghai-Suxi-Xichang area of the Yangtze River Delta as an example, the average daily turnover rate of single piles is 6.5 vehicles/pile. Sky. Its average turnover rate during the Chinese holiday was 9.2 vehicles/pile. days, higher than the usual day of 5.7 cars/pile. Sky. The time utilization index of the sample stations along the line also shows the characteristics of holidays, but the charging efficiency of different highways and different stations varies greatly, and the potential of network charging needs to be tapped.
Therefore, further promoting the improvement of energy replenishment infrastructure, improving the overall utilization rate of charging piles, and improving energy replenishment efficiency are still the focus of solving the long-distance range of electric vehicles.
Shengang Securities pointed out in the research report that the battery replacement mode will become an inevitable form of popularization of new energy vehicles in all scenarios, and is an effective supplement to the charging mode. In the industry's view, the battery exchange mode is a way to improve the efficiency of energy replenishment, and the 400V and 800V high-voltage charging launched by the new energy industry in recent years is also expected to greatly improve the charging efficiency of electric vehicles.
(Interviewees are pseudonyms)