BEV•Electrification of Vehicle•Charging System

R&D Consulting for BEV•Electrification of Vehicle•Charging System

While aggressive regulations on exhaust gas emission and the sales prohibition on ICE and HEV have been spreading in many countries, the sales proportion of BEV to other vehicles is rising and the development of new BEV platforms is becoming active in the automobile market. Some growing trends we see in particular are as follows:

Integrations of PCU or eAxle composed of motors, inverters, reducers/gear boxes or transmission with BEVs and HEVs
Integrations of AC/DC-OBC with high-/low-voltage DC/DC converters, and modularizations of DC/DC boost converter following a trend of heightening battery voltage capacity from 400V to 800V
Modularizations of charging-related and inverter-related functionalities

Module structure of 800V-based BEV in 2022-2024

New BEV platforms released during 2024-2026 will be based on the 800V power network. Further integrated drivetrain and charging ECU will be also applied to not only the module among the motors, the reducers/gear box and the inverters but the charging devices such as OBC and the DC-DC high/low voltage converters.

In order to respond to these industrial trends of heightened voltage and modularization, the then countermeasures we used to implement on heat dissipation, water/air cooling, insulation, and EMI are drastically changing their approaches; and these days, energy efficiency is being measured from cross-domain system perspectives, not from monolithic component perspectives. The trend shows that SiC-based power semiconductors, which cost much more than existing Si-IGBT, are being installed not only to diodes and OBC but also to transistors, DC-DC converters and converter modules. Making good use of the characteristics of SiC, including its thermal resistance, high voltage durability and compactness, taking an approach of designing the entire system from a holistic point of view by downsizing cooling levels and some passive component areas is being standardized. This kind of holistic system designing brings benefits to not just only powertrain but also to other BEV domains.

The good combination of SiC, 800V-DC charging, and the high-voltage-based drivetrain of BEV promotes the acceleration of higher energy efficiency and shorter charging time.

Targeted charging capacity and durations in the U.S., Europe and China

A targeted charging level of BEVs in Europe and the U.S. by the middle of the 2020s is as follows: Charging duration of one BEV which can run 100-200 miles when it is fully charged should be from 10 minutes to 15 minutes.

We have been researching and engaged in the advanced development projects related to battery, motor, inverter, gear box/transmission, DC-DC converter, OBC, AC and DC charging and V2G technologies. By utilizing the know-how, we navigate automotive OEMs, tier1s, and tier2s to the most appropriate direction through our continuous analyses on the latest trends.

On top of that, we have been also developing integrated software for BEV batteries, utility storages, and PVs, which can handle all these component as one system in a very efficient and cost-saving manner.

Taking general households’ and utility companies’ point of view, we make researches on how utility companies, energy integrators or charging providers should apply appropriate electricity tariff, forecast power volume to be generated and the demand for PVs, and how much they should charge and discharge batteries of BEVs.