In April 2024, CCTV News reported that "the mainland's first electric heavy truck virtual power plant was built in Tangshan", which attracted industry attention.
In recent years, Tangshan, the "steel city", has actively practiced the "double carbon" strategy, the use of electric heavy trucks has increased year by year, and has aggregated 11 heavy truck charging and swapping station battery energy storage resources, more than 100,000 electric heavy trucks have participated in the peak and valley adjustment of the power grid for the first time, and the maximum amount of electricity that can be adjusted exceeds 20,000 kilowatt hours, and the operation mode of electric heavy truck virtual power plant has been initially built. Among them is the Caofeidian heavy truck super charging station serving Qianxi Iron and Steel.
During the 2024 China Electric Vehicle 100 Forum, the bus terminal network interviewed Sun Maojian, president of the strategic development of Hunanneng New Energy, the service company of the supercharging station.
He said: "The integration of vehicle energy can realize two-way interaction with the power grid with the help of intelligent and orderly charging, overcharging technology, bidirectional charging, new energy storage, virtual power plant and other technologies, further improve the intelligent level and market-oriented operation ability of the power grid, and also optimize the charging behavior of new energy vehicles, providing a stable and powerful guarantee for the charging system." ”
Multi-industry synergy, vehicle energy integration industry potential is huge
With the rapid rise of the new energy vehicle industry and the continuous improvement of the intelligent level of the power grid, a close integration between "vehicle" and "energy" is gradually forming. In June 2023, the executive meeting of the State Council pointed out that it is necessary to build an industrial ecology with the integrated development of "vehicle energy, road and cloud".
Ouyang Minggao, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, once said in public that "car energy road cloud" involves automobiles, energy, information, and transportation. These industries were loosely combined in the early stage of the development of new energy vehicles, and will gradually transition from loose combinations to deep integration in the future, which is an inevitable trend in the development of technology and market.
Sun Maojian also said: "As an efficient energy storage unit, new energy vehicles play an important role in the energy revolution, we need to equip smart cars with reliable energy, through combination, charging and swapping, storage and charging, optical storage and charging integration, supercharging and other combinations to promote the number of new energy vehicles to a new level." ”
In fact, with the popularization of new energy vehicles and the increase in the load of urban power distribution networks, the relationship between charging companies, automobile manufacturers and battery suppliers has slowly moved from loose to close integration, and the charging mode is also moving towards orderly charging.
In addition, the potential of vehicle-energy integration is not only limited to peak shaving, valley filling, and load peak adjustment, but more importantly, it can also attract more investors to participate in green electricity market-based transactions, stimulate the enthusiasm of electric vehicle users, operators, aggregators, new energy vehicle suppliers, and multiple stakeholders in the power grid, so as to promote the low-carbon transformation of the entire energy system.
With the development of the new energy vehicle industry, the continuous innovation and integration of technologies such as big data, cloud computing, and AI, as well as the increasing improvement of infrastructure such as smart roads, the industrial ecology of the integrated development of vehicle energy is becoming more and more broad.
The integration of vehicles and energy replenishment is still the biggest problem
In the whole life cycle of the development of new energy vehicles, energy replenishment is the most important part. It is undeniable that the biggest problem facing the development of vehicle-network interaction is the insufficient charging infrastructure and the low efficiency of energy replenishment.
Specifically, the first is the insufficient number of charging piles and the uneven layout. By the end of 2023, the total number of charging infrastructure in mainland China has reached 8.596 million units, and the number of new energy vehicles in China has reached 20.41 million in the same period. From the perspective of the layout of charging piles, only 12 provinces such as Guangdong, Jiangsu, and Hubei have achieved full coverage of charging stations and charging piles in urban and rural areas.
"Jingneng New Energy mainly focuses on charging, battery swapping, sodium electric energy storage, smart energy platform, optical storage, charging, passing, inspection and mutual energy island and other fields. At the end of last year, it participated in the activities of new energy vehicles in Loudi City to the countryside to provide efficient charging services for rural areas. Sun Maojian said.
Second, the efficiency of energy replenishment is not high. At this stage, fast energy replenishment is mainly divided into two solutions: 800V ultra-fast charging and battery swapping. In the 800V ultra-fast charging scenario, the charging power is as high as 600KW, and if the number of 800V ultra-fast charging piles is concentrated, it will have a certain impact on the distribution network. At the same time, the high input cost, insufficient number and imperfect related standards of battery swap stations have also hindered the promotion of battery swap mode to a certain extent.
In fact, in terms of improving the efficiency of energy replenishment, Jingneng New Energy has achieved good results in the first trial. The Caofeidian Heavy Truck Super Charging Station project built in Tangshan to serve Qianxi Iron and Steel Transportation has developed its own leading maintenance-free glue filling module and independent air duct technology at that time, which solves the problems of dust in the transportation of heavy truck fleets. Since the completion of the station, 26 electric piles have been fully operational, serving more than 150 vehicles, and it has become profitable in less than a year, achieving a win-win situation with the fleet, Sany Heavy Truck and other partners.
The third is the issue of standards related to vehicle-network interaction. Although the call for unified charging pile standards has continued for many years, for various reasons, the current major car companies are still fighting their own battles.
"To solve these problems, it is necessary to strengthen the construction of intelligent and charging infrastructure, formulate unified standards and protocols, create a high-quality intelligent charging and swapping grid, and form an aggregated vehicle-energy integration system. Sun Maojian said.
With the continuous progress of technology and the continuous expansion of the market, the automobile, energy, information, transportation and other industries have gradually achieved deep integration. At that time, it will also promote scientific and technological innovation to give birth to a new type of infrastructure for optical storage, charging, swapping, inspection and mutual inspection, accelerate the formation of new energy quality productivity, and inject new momentum into the high-quality development of the new energy vehicle industry.
"At present, the 'energy island' project we are focusing on is to integrate 'supply, storage, charging, exchange, communication, inspection and mutuality' to promote the development of charging technology and the efficient integration of vehicle energy. ”