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Energy anxiety is the biggest obstacle for people to embrace electric vehicles.

There are currently two ways to solve this problem. One is to continuously increase battery capacity and increase driving range; the other is to use ultra-fast charging technology to shorten charging time.

The former is limited by factors such as battery technology, body structure, weight, and cost. Before solid-state batteries are officially mass-produced, the capacity of lithium batteries has basically reached a bottleneck, and there is almost no possibility of significant improvement.

Ultra-fast charging is the energy replenishment technology currently promoted by mainstream car companies.Xiaopeng、Zeekr、Zhiji, Huawei and other brands are promoting and popularizing their own ultra-fast charging technology.

Although the specific technical indicators and parameters of ultra-fast charging vary slightly among car companies, the principle is generally to use an 800V high-voltage platform with a 4C or even 5C high-rate battery, and then use the corresponding charging pile to achieve faster charging efficiency, achieving a range of 200 kilometers in 5 minutes and a running speed of one kilometer in one second.

In terms of charging piles, the government also has a definition standard for ultra-fast charging. The China Association for Standardization's "Guidelines for the Operation and Management of Public Charging Stations for Electric Vehicles" clearly states that charging equipment with a power range of ≥360kw, a single-gun output power peak of ≥360kw, and a reference current of ≥40A can be called "ultra-fast charging."

Some automakers have built their own ultra-fast charging piles, with a peak power of up to 800kw per gun. It is no exaggeration to say that charging with such a charging pile is as fast as refueling.

But whether it is worth it for car buyers to pay for ultra-fast charging technology is another matter.

As a technology promoted by car companies, people often only talk about the "good" of ultra-fast charging, but never mention the shortcomings of ultra-fast charging. In fact, just like whether fast charging of mobile phones will damage the battery, the ultra-fast charging technology of vehicles is also controversial.

Recently, an automotive blogger pointed out this problem. The blogger cited a charging study by China Automotive Research Institute and Tianjin University as an example. The experimental results showed that after 1500 cycles of 1C charging + 1C discharging, the battery internal resistance decayed little. The decay of 2C charging + 1C discharging was slightly more, but it was still usable. The 4C charging + 1C discharging cycle was out of the test after 1100 cycles because the battery was scrapped. The 6C charging + 1C discharging charging cycle was scrapped after 700 cycles.

The simple explanation is that a 4C battery can no longer be used after 1,100 super-fast charges, and a 6C battery will be scrapped after 700 super-fast charges.

Experiments have shown that the three indicators of battery life: capacity, power and internal resistance, are all very obviously negatively correlated with the charging rate. The impact of ultra-fast charging is not only a decrease in battery capacity, but also a decrease in battery discharge power.

In addition, the blogger also pointed out that the ultra-fast charging battery pack generates a lot of heat and requires an air conditioning system to cool it down during charging. However, the current vehicle air conditioning compressor cannot meet the heat dissipation needs of the battery pack at all. If ultra-fast charging is used for a long time, the battery decay rate under high current and high temperature pressure should theoretically be faster than the experimental data.

What does this mean? If you buy an electric car with super-fast charging technology and use super-charging for a long time, it is very likely that the performance of the vehicle battery will decline significantly after a few years. Not only will the range anxiety not be alleviated, but the power performance will even decline, and the safety risks will also increase.

Finally, the blogger questioned whether car companies are "gambling" by pushing ultra-fast charging technology.

There are not many supercharging piles now. Taking Zeekr, which has the largest number of superfast charging piles, as an example, its self-built 800V superfast charging piles only have about 2,500 in total across the country.

Most car owners don't actually use ultra-fast charging very often, so battery performance degradation will not occur significantly.

Regarding the question raised by this blogger, I believe what he said is true because it is supported by experimental results conducted by professional organizations.

Some netizens also said that even if high-rate charging of batteries will seriously affect their lifespan, manufacturers will make relevant strategic protections and adjust the charging power to minimize the damage to the battery caused by fast charging. If you are afraid of this and that, why buy a tram? If the tram is parked and not driven, the battery will also decay.

Indeed, cars are also consumables. From the perspective of use, the car starts to depreciate as soon as you buy it, and electric cars are even worse than gasoline cars.

Judging from the current speed of construction and popularization of ultra-fast charging equipment, ordinary car owners may not necessarily encounter excessive loss of battery life due to the use of ultra-fast charging within a car replacement cycle.

But it’s different if we look at it from the perspective of car buying.

Because it means that we spend more money to buy a technology that we want to use but dare not use. When we want to use it, there are not many charging stations, and we may not have the conditions to use it. We don’t use it often at ordinary times; if we have the conditions to use it frequently, we are worried that it will seriously affect the life of the whole vehicle.

Currently, most of the models equipped with ultra-fast charging technology on the 800V platform are mid-to-high-end models priced at more than 250,000 yuan. Cars equipped with high-rate batteries above 4C are several tens of thousands of yuan more expensive than versions equipped with low-rate batteries.

Most of the buyers of these products are keen on experiencing new technologies, and they buy products with ultra-fast charging technology in the hope of alleviating range anxiety. But if they spend more money to get a technology that they cannot use or dare not use, and the 800V electric car still uses ordinary charging piles or home charging, then what is the significance of ultra-fast charging?

So, if you buy an electric car now, would you consider buying a more expensive model with super-fast charging technology? Why not come to the comment section to discuss it together. (Text/Youshi Auto Laopao)

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