From August 13 to 15, 2020, the "2020 China Automotive Forum" was grandly held in Shanghai. The forum is hosted by the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM) and the only industry-leading forum supported by the World Automobile Organization (OICA) and the World Economic Forum (WEF). With the theme of "New Changes, New Challenges, New Ideas-Leading China's Automotive New Journey", this forum closely follows the pulse of the times, seeks for breakthroughs, closely focuses on the "14th Five-Year Plan", controls the macro industry situation, and analyzes global automobiles Industry development trends. Among them, at the "Global Automotive Technology Development Leadership Summit" sub-forum held on the afternoon of August 14, Audi China Digital and New Energy Vehicle Senior R&D Director Mr.Heinz-Willi Vassen (范恒威) published the title " A wonderful speech on Battery Technology and Safety. The following is a record of the live speech:
Fan Hengwei: Thank you very much, Professor Zhao Fuquan, good afternoon everyone! I am very happy to be here. My name is Mr. Heinz-Willi Vassen. I am the Director of Digital and New Energy Vehicle R&D from Audi China. At the same time, I am working in Beijing. Today I want to talk about the new energy battery system and what we are in front of. challenge.
First of all, we talked about China. China is now the leading market for new energy vehicles, and China can now be said to be the largest market for automobile production and sales in the world. And we can also see that China also has very good battery companies like CATL and BYD. China's lithium battery production is the largest in the world, and it is now also facing industrial transformation and upgrading. The protection of the entire industrial chain, starting with raw materials, is now very important. New energy vehicles can be said to adopt very new technologies, which are very beneficial and bring benefits in all aspects, so we need to promote its further development.
Whether it is transportation or other aspects, I think China's current strategy is correct.
Here I want to show everyone. This is our new Audi pure electric car, which also represents our future development direction. It is called Audi E-tron. Next we will launch its local version. All key components including power batteries are produced by local suppliers. Now we can achieve a charging time of 40 minutes, and can reach a speed of up to 200 kilometers per hour. The acceleration time from 100 kilometers is also very good, less than 5.7 seconds. When it can reach more than 50 kilometers, we can also see that it has a very long cruising range, which can reach 470 kilometers under NEDC.
Audi also launched the E-tron CT car. This car uses 800 volt circuit equipment, which represents the future direction. It can reach a peak power of 430 kilowatts and an acceleration time of 3.5 seconds. It has a cruising range under WLTP. Over 400 kilometers, the charging time can be within 20 minutes. Of course, this also depends on the power and the performance of the charging station. We can achieve very fast charging. Let's take a look at this is our future model. This is our pure electric platform. E-tron is built on the MEB platform. We also have JTI high-performance cars built on the J1 high-performance platform, as well as Audi Q4 E-tron cars, which are The work we are now very concerned about is related to the construction of high-end car brands in the future.
must be promoted, like the construction of a sustainable supply chain in China, we know that there are two-thirds of the car models, which are built on the traditional platform, besides we are also developing our MEB Platform, now we need to consider a new way of thinking about car power. And we also very much hope to establish deeper cooperation with our partners. We are very open in this regard. We already have many partners in China to provide us with automotive lithium-ion batteries, including Lishen, BYD, CATL, etc. , And we hope to establish a balanced pattern of suppliers and partners to meet our rapidly growing needs and be able to meet the needs of the entire market in the future.
Therefore, we can say that we cannot put all this responsibility on one supplier, hoping that everyone can get a balanced development. This is the earliest development project we decided to do in 2018. We hope to integrate the future There is a good balance between volume and supplier partners.
First of all, for automotive lithiumThe development of ion power batteries is still highly variable and dynamic. Different market participants are at different stages and maturity levels. Audi and Volkswagen have unique expectations for the performance of the entire battery. Under normal circumstances, our product department will Take it directly from the market, we will have unique needs. Therefore, we have also started the battery cell project, and it has been continuously strengthened. There are six partners, including our MEB pure electric vehicle platform, and we share our input and output.
We are also very important to us in the entire car process and technical specifications, and we must establish a good cooperation. Sometimes we would rather spend a little more time to do these two pieces well. In addition, we pay attention to the moments when each milestone is established, and we have done a lot of sample tests. In addition, we have a partner in China that has started production and SOP. There will also be another battery cell project on the MEB platform in the second half of this year.
In addition, there is another instruction for a second partner who will also cooperate on our future platform. We have already begun the process of industrialization of power battery cells, and we have reached several key milestones for our large projects. , Of course, this is only the first most critical milestone. We have a series of products to start production. We hope to establish a solid supply chain in China. Before that, Dr. Mu Tuorui also introduced us to the importance of partners. We are in China. It has also further developed partnerships, including our holding of 26 shares and becoming the largest shareholder of Guoxuan Hi-Tech. It is also a well-known domestic power battery manufacturer. The Volkswagen Group has invested more than 1 billion euros in equity. It is also to establish our entire electric travel driving chain. It also represents Audi's commitment to China and a commitment to China's new energy vehicle and electric vehicle market.
Next, we will enter more specific battery technology. In addition to the challenges mentioned in the supply chain, including the rapid changes in the technology itself, we look forward to the future. It was from lithium iron phosphate almost ten years ago, which is also a passenger car. The earliest used. Now ternary materials are used, 111 first, then 532, and now 622. Now there are a series of products like this on the same market. They all hope to increase the energy density, but ensure that it has a very good driving range.
In addition, the battery itself has also changed a lot compared with ten years ago. Some have doubled, doubled or tripled in size. We must meet the safety requirements in the middle, especially It is a series of thermal runaways, thermal events, and thermal management. There is a small photo on the right, which actually lists the problems with the highest emissions, reaching 1200 degrees. We are going to manage this situation. This is the event of a thermal runaway of the Sanyuan 811 battery. It is also a big challenge to manage the high temperature exhaust gas temperature. This is what we want to mention that we must fully understand, including our choice of cobalt-free, including the development of lithium iron phosphate. We have developed from the previously developed energy density from 120 to higher 170, which is the energy density of lithium iron phosphate batteries without cobalt.
Similarly, we will also pay attention to safety behavior and cycle life. Everyone will also pay attention to cost, not only considering high energy density, we must pay attention to its safety and cost, so the development of lithium iron phosphate in the past ten years It has been developed very well, safety is an advantage, cycle life is better, and the energy density of the optimized lithium iron phosphate battery has reached 170, so it has been considered for use in passenger cars again. Let’s take a look at the LFP phosphoric acid A series of tests done on iron-lithium, whether it is overcharge, short circuit, open circuit, acupuncture, thermal stability, in fact, compared with the same high-energy ternary material battery, our safety goals and system level are easier to achieve. , So this is what we consider.
In addition to the technical changes mentioned above, we will also have a lot of changes in a series of regulations, including test procedures. For example, some tests at the battery level are like overcharging. 150% SOC is reduced to 120% SOC. We see that the acupuncture test has been cancelled. In addition, the safety tests for all modules have also been cancelled, but the increase is the increase in system-level safety tests, including thermal diffusion, especially attention If the heat is out of control, the driver must be given sufficient warning, and at least five minutes must be taken to ensure that there is no open flame outside the battery system. Therefore, we need to give the driver enough safety redundancy during the use process to allow him to leave the car in five minutes. These are allReasonable.
In addition, as these materials are also changing, these changes and changes in regulations are moving forward at the same time. In the next step, we must continue to learn from the entire industry's footsteps and make optimizations. At the same time The same is true for investment. We can control what we want to achieve in the middle, such as thermal runaway events, including in the battery system, we can pay attention to the entire gas exhaust channel, the heat insulation pad between the cells, and the installation temperature includes Gas sensors, fire-resistant materials are placed on the upper side of the module, and there are special gas exhaust equipment, all of which are also technically possible.
From another perspective, because the current system is space-given, if there is no way to implement such changes in a given space, it will directly affect the interface of the car battery system, and the cost it brings is high Yes, and the challenge for developers is huge. If we look further into the future, we will already see these two materials in the near future, one is lithium iron phosphate and the other is ternary battery materials. Both of them now occupy a large market share. Perhaps for lithium iron phosphate, These sporty sports cars will also have a lot of use, and the battery system will be different for different market segments, including the processing of the batteries, so that the lithium iron phosphate processing system and the ternary lithium battery system will be different. It will also increase the complexity of the system. Maybe the same car will have two different systems? In addition, it can give us better opportunities and better products in the market.
In addition, it’s very important that we also need to make sure that the tests we perform meet the test at the component level. In addition, in the process, it is not only to focus on the middle or optimistic about the middle system or material, different The materials need different measures. In addition, for pure electric vehicles, there must be efficient and safe system design. Sometimes it is not only at the battery level but also at the vehicle level. So the question we answer is where to install the solution? We are also constantly thinking and testing. The component testing and regulations mentioned above are not only focusing on a certain indicator, but we hope that it can be an overall technical solution that can bring efficient and optimized results as a whole, so the design There must also be a certain degree of redundancy and freedom to make flexible adjustments in the future.
In addition, for the development of technological solutions, we must emphasize the concept and mentality of open competition, not just pay attention to one of them. In addition to supply chain and technical issues. We are facing another technical challenge or a very hot topic. For new energy vehicles, we will mention chargers. For our customers, the infrastructure is very relevant. For all our users, they must be very positive about charging. An experience. In the market, we see that in different cities, maybe there are Shenzhen, Beijing and different charging operators in various cities, so there are a lot of them. On the one hand, a large number is not a bad thing, and it is good for competition in technology and business. . On the other hand, all charging operators have their own unique software providers and hardware. It is not easy for them to cooperate with the same standardized interface, because there will be software problems and analytical problems in the middle.
If we do a series of charging solutions in China, we will find that there are almost 43 different charging pile models, so there are completely different observations behind them, such as charging, sometimes between infrastructure and cars Sometimes the charging speed is very slow. It is expected that many cars are charging in the same place. Therefore, the overall charging power is relatively low. Sometimes it is found that the charging cannot be started or even the charging cannot be accessed. Maybe the charging station itself has problems with this place or the parking station.
All these are what Audi hopes to solve. Of course, now that the software cannot be unified and the charging standard cannot be unified, it has brought a series of inconveniences to our users. This is also the pain point we solve. In addition, this page also shows you. For example, the supplier has many charging stations and charging piles. When we go to another supplier, we will still find some large and small software and hardware problems, parsing errors, etc., charging is really A big pain point, and we test more interoperability to bring better convenience to customers.
finally comes to a simple summary, China has become the world’s largest output of lithium-ion batteries, and the entire industry is also very willing to continueInvest forward and pay great attention to future demand. Whether it is Volkswagen or Audi, they are also facing rapid growth in demand for lithium-ion power batteries for automobiles. This is also a very important market for us, and it is expected that the volume in China will increase We will also work closely with local partners. Now it has been mentioned that we have six partners on our two platforms. We are also trying our best to cultivate the supply chain sustainably at different milestones. We hope that China can also feed back the world.
In addition, we also mentioned the changes in a series of materials and regulations, which bring some challenges to someone, as well as many lessons and opportunities to continuously optimize investment. Different technologies require different solutions, and we are also very willing to see tests conducted at the electrode level, or to support an environment of open competition for technical solutions. Including the lack of unified charging standards or the great inconvenience to our pure electric vehicle users, we need to propose more tests on the interoperability of charging piles. Both infrastructure and cars need to be synchronized. Of course, this is not easy. This is a very important interface. We hope to make more progress on this side in the future. Thank you for listening.
(Note: This article is organized based on on-site shorthand and has not been reviewed by speakers)
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-