With the rapid growth of new energy vehicle sales, electric vehicles are becoming a trend in the army of self-driving travel during the May Day holiday.
A few days ago, Zhang Hong, secretary general of the new energy vehicle branch of the Circulation Association, said in an interview with the Beijing News shell financial reporter that at present, new energy vehicles are developing rapidly, and energy replenishment is becoming increasingly convenient. Long-distance travel is still risky during peak periods, while suburban travel is becoming more sophisticated.
Is there any range anxiety about electric vehicle self-driving short trips, whether there is a long queue for energy replenishment, and how convenient are charging facilities today? May Day set off a travel boom, Beijing News shell financial reporters went back and forth to Beijing and Tianjin to experience electric vehicle replenishment.
Night shift off-peak charging, charging pile "a little busy"
On April 28, a thunderstorm fell in Beijing, making already busy roads even more congested. The shell financial reporter noticed that it took nearly 5 hours for Beijing to reach Tianjin at 4 o'clock in the afternoon, compared with about 1.5-2 hours for a self-driving trip on weekdays.
Off-peak travel has become the choice of many people. At ten o'clock in the evening, the reporter drove a Hechuang A06 electric car with a cruising range of about 470 kilometers (non-full battery life) and embarked on a journey to Beichen District of Tianjin.
The one-way journey between Beijing and Tianjin is about 120 kilometers, and despite severe congestion, there is no charging anxiety for nearly 500 kilometers. After about 1 hour of departure, the shell financial reporter arrived at the first charging service area on the Beijing-Tianjin Expressway - Majuqiao Service Area. There are about 10 charging piles set up here, and by 11:30 p.m. on April 28, all of them were occupied, and several electric vehicles were still lining up to be charged.
Majuqiao service area online car queue for charging. Photo/Beijing News shell financial reporter Bai Haotian
Shell financial reporters interviewed and learned that the queue waiting for charging is mainly online car-hailing. A ride-hailing driver said that he lives nearby and often comes here to charge because of the lower charging cost and convenience.
It is worth mentioning that individual electric vehicles in the service area did not leave in time after charging. "This should also be a ride-hailing car, but he doesn't pull out a gun after charging." We suggest that relevant functional departments can issue policies to manage these occupancy cars. As the queue lengthened, the waiting drivers complained.
Leaving the Majuqiao service area, the shell financial reporter drove about 60 kilometers to the second and last service area from Beijing to Tianjin (Beijing-Tianjin Expressway) - Xuguantun service area. Perhaps because it was early in the morning, there was no new energy vehicle charging at the three charging piles in the dark night. When the reporter was about to leave, a discontinued Great Wall Ora black cat came to charge, and the owner worked in Wuqing District, Tianjin, and found a charging pile on the way home to replenish power. "There are only ten kilometers left in the range, which is too limiting."
There are almost no cars charging in the Xuguantun service area. Photo/Beijing News shell financial reporter Bai Haotian
Shell financial reporters noticed that the terrain around the charging pile in this service area is low-lying, and a large amount of stagnant water brought by a rapid rain has not been drained and gathered near the charging pile.
According to public data, the charging pile charging standards of Majuqiao service area and Xuguantun service area during the peak period are 1.6 yuan and 2.1 yuan per kWh.
Driving to the destination Beichen District of Tianjin, the cruising range of the Shell Financial Reporter is 294 kilometers, which means that the one-way consumption of 176 kilometers of cruising range. Shell financial reporter search e charging APP saw that there are two charging stations a few kilometers nearby, the price is relatively affordable, one of the charging stations is only 0.7886 yuan per kWh, the station has a total of 8 fast charging piles. The price of another charging station is 0.9586 yuan per kWh, and 10 charging piles are also more abundant.
Tianjin urban area replenished energy worry-free, occupying a seat for two hours was fined more than 15 yuan
On April 29, the shell financial reporter drove to the city center according to the plan, consuming more than 10 kilometers of cruising range. In view of the fact that the oncoming vehicle power off speed is not low, the shell financial reporter decided to replenish energy locally and found an electric vehicle charging area on the third basement floor of Lujiazui Center in Hongqiao District, and its peak charging price was about 1.2 yuan per kWh.
The number of charging piles in Tianjin Lujiazui Square is about 30, and although there are many charging vehicles, there were no queues at that time. This charging station operator is a special call, and the charging operation is also more conventional: WeChat scan the code to activate the charging pile and charge it through the mini program, and the user can choose to charge without storing value.
During this period, after two failed attempts to charge, the shell financial reporter inserted the charging gun back into the charging base, and then unplugged it for use after a period of time, and finally successfully activated the charging program. The data shows that in the first two minutes, the charging pile current is only 18 amps, and the power is 7 kilowatts, which is close to the slow charging pile. After a few minutes, the vehicle charging speed increased rapidly, reaching a maximum charging power of 70 kilowatts. It took 40 minutes and the vehicle's battery display increased from 50% to 90%.
The occupancy fee is 15.67 yuan. Screenshot/Star Charging applet
However, there are also "small episodes" in the entire charging process. After confirming that the charging was turned on, the shell financial reporter went to the commercial building, during which he found through the mobile phone that due to the choice of "balance charging" in the charging payment method, the balance of 19 yuan was quickly used up, and the vehicle also stopped charging, and the charging amount was only 14.6 degrees.
After that, the reporter remotely started the "credit charging" again through the relevant mini program to complete the vehicle's electric energy replenishment. Due to the stay time of up to two hours, the reporter also "paid the price" for not charging the seat, and was eventually deducted more than 15 yuan for the occupancy fee.
At the beginning of this year, the Ministry of Public Security released the latest statistics that in 2022, the number of motor vehicles in the country will reach 417 million, of which 319 million are cars. The number of new energy vehicles in mainland China reached 13.1 million, a year-on-year increase of 67.13%, showing a rapid growth trend. As new energy vehicles enter more households, it is inevitable to queue for charging during peak hours, and setting a reasonable occupancy fee may also be one of the issues worth thinking about in the future development of new energy vehicles.
"Squeeze" NIO for power stations
With the battery charged to 90%, the range of the vehicle driven by the shell financial reporter also reached about 560 kilometers, making the journey back to Beijing more comfortable.
On April 30, the original road returned, and the reporter passed through the Xuguantun service area and the Majuqiao service area again at noon and afternoon, the former had no car charging on the charging pile, and the latter only one car occupied the parking space. The owner and his wife said that they were only going to the suburbs to do errands and charging along the way, not tourists.
Majuqiao service area charging station. Photo/Beijing News shell financial reporter Bai Haotian
In the experience of shell financial reporters in a few days, electric vehicles encountered the peak of May Day travel, and the charging piles along the Beijing-Tianjin line did not appear in short supply and long queues of vehicles.
However, at the Majuqiao NIO car exchange station, the staff said that perhaps due to the opening of high-speed free power exchange during this holiday, there have been many power exchange vehicles in recent days.
Majuqiao service area NIO exchange station. Photo/Beijing News shell financial reporter Bai Haotian
"This morning and noon are very lively, when you came, we had just finished busy work, and now the two 100-degree batteries in the station are not fully charged, so some cars can only choose fast charging." The reporter followed the direction pointed by the staff and saw that on the side of the exchange station, a NIO ES7 was charging.
Previously, NIO announced that from April 28 to May 4, 362 expressway swap stations across the country will provide unlimited free swap services to all NIO vehicles (except commercial vehicles), of which the high-speed service area swap stations will provide 24-hour service.
NIO's official data shows that on April 28, NIO ushered in the peak of power replacement, reaching 62,746 times in a single day, a record high. The next day, that is, the first day of the small long holiday, the number of power changes in NIO once again refreshed the historical data, with 68,748 power changes in a single day and 23,460 free high-speed power changes.
Automotive analyst Ling Ran said that there are several main reasons for the convenience of pure electric vehicles in the suburbs, first, the continuous development of new energy vehicles, the cruising range has reached a high level, and the performance of 400 kilometers to 600 kilometers is enough to cope with the vast majority of "suburban travel"; Secondly, in recent years, the charging infrastructure has been continuously developed, and there are more and more charging piles, and users can often find charging piles in urban business districts with a high degree of development and replenish energy; Finally, with the increasing development of electric vehicles, users will also use electric vehicles rationally, and the energy replenishment behavior will be more rational, and the new energy vehicle replenishment will be planned in advance.
A few days ago, the China Charging Alliance officially issued a document saying that as of March 2023, member units in the alliance have reported a total of 1.958 million public charging piles.
In this regard, Ling Ran said that although the experience of electric vehicles to and from Beijing and Tianjin is very good, in cities with relatively low development, charging problems may still exist. For example, in the small city of Zibo, which has recently caught fire, when the flow of people and vehicles is large, the charging situation may not be particularly optimistic.
Beijing News shell financial reporter Bai Haotian Editor Wang Jinyu Proofreader Fu Chunshu