If you’ve cut the cords of your smartphone with a charging dock for your bedside table and one in your car — and if you’re lucky — wireless CarPlay or Android Auto — you might have an idea for a changeover. Inductive charging wireless game could be for electric cars.
Instead of trying to organize a toddler or a grocery bag while you have one hand cluttered with cables and light and dark charging connectors, it could simply be a matter of parking, moving on. live and return to a charged vehicle.
And once you experience it, there’s no going back. When was the last time you thought about plugging an ethernet cable — or phone line — into your laptop?
How does wireless EV charging work?
Wireless charging uses the principle of electromagnetic induction to transmit electrical energy in the air in the form of a magnetic field. You might also hear it called inductive charging — or, backup, wireless inductive charging.
Volvo tests inductive charging with C30 Electric
In a nutshell, electric current induces current on a copper coil, which is emitted at a certain frequency – one not far from FM radio frequencies, for the most likely applications. That creates an oscillating magnetic field, which will then be captured by another copper coil.
With the ability to fine-tune the signal depending on distance and the help of capacitors — and some core physics ideas like the idea of resonant frequencies — wireless charging could become practical for electric vehicle without losing too much energy.
Come close
Technically, the system requires two pieces of hardware: a transmitter for the driveway or garage floor connected to a dedicated circuit, like a wall charger, and a receiver mounted on the bottom. of the vehicle.
Wireless Charger BMW 530e iPerformance 2018
Wireless Charger BMW 530e iPerformance 2018
Wireless Charger BMW 530e iPerformance 2018
Systems from WiTricity, the company that has emerged as a technology leader, and others will follow the J2954 standard designed to make wireless charging reliably usable at approx. 10 to 25 centimeters (3.9 and 9.8 inches) apart, meeting the ground clearance of nearly any production vehicle, from sports cars to off-road SUVs. And at 11 kW, it gives the typical EV back a range of about 35 miles per hour parked.
With a built-in alignment method as standard, a low-power signal from the dashboard helps to show the driver where the vehicle will be parked or it’s fully automated. A wi-fi handshake accomplishes what would essentially be a touchless version of Plug and Charge — Park and Charge, essentially. Voilà.
With around 85% of charging done at home, this is designed to be an everyday method of charging, not a technology specifically intended for road trips. WiTricity CEO Alex Gruzen said: “Ultimately the car will feel like a car with limitless range. “They drive it, they park it, they never have to do anything.”
How effective is wireless car charging?
The efficiency of Qi wireless charging in your smartphone is as high as 80%, but most likely less than 70%, that’s why your phone gets very hot when you remove the charger like that. That system is designed to be thin and cheap, but with such a higher power level, car charging systems can’t waste that way and have been specifically designed to increase efficiency.
Nissan wireless charging system
Since the last time some automakers tested factory-installed technology — like Nissan for the Leaf, more than a decade ago (above), efficiency has improved. Coil to coil, WiTricity’s technology, receives 99% of the energy transferred through the air gap. Most other stages are the same — and no lossy isolating transformers are needed, saving energy. From the circuit box to the car, the efficiency of a wireless system is typically 90% to 92%, right around where most charging outlets are located.
Why is it better?
From a market perspective, wireless charging technology could make electric vehicles much more livable on a day-to-day basis — especially for those who see everyday charging cables and connectors as a hassle.
While those cables and connectors need to be replaced every few years, wireless charging hardware doesn’t have those points of wear and tear. Snow and ice won’t get in the way either.
Mercedes-Benz wireless inductive charging system
Also, as we move towards higher EV adoption, if wireless charging is used more often, for the sake of convenience, it has the potential to reduce the need for DC fast charging which is more of a burden on the grid. electricity.
What are the limitations?
The cost is a big one. The optional price of wireless charging can run into the thousands. Due to the need for two large sets of hardware components, it will always cost more than a wall or rear charger.
With the charging dock much more difficult to move than the charging connector, the inflexibility of wireless charging can be an issue for some households accustomed to changing parking plans at night.
Interoperability between matched and matched wireless charging components is not an issue; That’s the whole point of waiting until the industry agrees on a standard, and here it is.
Which electric vehicles offer wireless charging?
Not currently available in the US, but that will change soon.
2023 Genesis GV60
Globally, the rollout has already begun, and it’s all very recent. Genesis GV60 offers The world’s first wireless charging integrated factoryand it was included in versions for the Korean domestic market as part of a pilot program. Hyundai has included this technology in the development of its dedicated electric vehicle E-GMP platform, so expect to see it in more models and markets soon.
In China, the technology is newly adopted in electric vehicles from FAW’s Hongqi brand, as well as IM Motors, a joint venture of China’s SAIC Motor and e-commerce giant Alibaba. It’s also included in the Alibaba-backed Zhiji L7.
There have been aftermarket wireless charging solutions for years – most notably from Plugless Power, which supplied a system for the Tesla Model S. A. Tesla Model 3 . System from WiTricity is also working.
BMW 5-Series plug-in hybrid wireless charging system
BMW has tested wireless charging in the United States in its 5-Series plug-in hybrid, but this testing was not extended beyond a small test program.
Other labs and startups are currently working on high-powered wireless charging, with speeds comparable to DC fast charging, but it could be a decade before it becomes a viable option. .
Why has wireless charging not started yet?
Simply put, the technology is not ready yet. But it has been used for a long time.
Wireless charging was originally proposed and demonstrated by Nikola Tesla more than a hundred years ago, but it has been around for decades at the experimental stage of application. A series of advancements over the past 15 years have driven the evolution of technology to levels that are reliable, efficient, and easy to pack.
While Qi wireless charging for smartphones may be the first time this technology has gone mainstream, it was tested and applied in the first vehicles – decades ago. But a series of consolidations in recent years have helped push it from becoming more commercially viable. Halo and WiTricity both started operations in 2010 and took the car wireless charging efforts out of university labs and into fledgling companies. Qualcomm bought HaloIPT in 2011, followed by US-based WiTricity, which is working on its own slightly different solution, acquisition and merger with Qualcomm Halo in 2019.
Wireless charging in the parking lot – WiTricity
WiTricity then “immediately embarked on consolidating the architecture… leveraging the best of both sides, to be able to present SAE with a common architecture that we thought was the answer.” words,” Gruzen recalled.
That was crucial in getting the SAE J2954 standard approved in October 2020 — essentially a signal that the technology could be brought to market.
Future
Global automotive and vehicle supplier Siemens invested $25 million in WiTricity in June 2022, and that partnership will deliver solutions for the home, parking, workplace or fleet.
Siemens predicts that the wireless charging market will reach $2 billion by 2028 in Europe and North America alone.
ORNL wireless charging demonstration with UPS hybrid truck
While home solutions — and the current SAE standard — go up to 11 kW — we should see higher power versions of this system for fleets. That could largely come from a diverse group of companies, including HEVO and Wireless Momentum, among others. Separately, there’s another group of companies working on wireless dynamic charging — a relative dream these days of charging cars through some of the same principles as a controlled vehicle.
The aftermarket may also develop. Power supply does not need to be plugged inThe company, which has previously sold aftermarket systems for the Tesla Model S, Nissan Leaf and others, will also unveil new-generation systems this year with a target price of around $3,500, with one that will complete alignment of the pads via an Apple CarPlay Interface.
Evatran Wireless Charger for Tesla Model S
WiTricity points to the company’s own authorized surveys showing background interested in a technology that they may never have met in person in the car. It found that based on concept alone, “electric vehicle considerers” who had not yet committed to the idea of buying an electric vehicle increased their purchase intention from 35% to 59% with inbuilt wireless charging . A more recent survey for the company shows that a lot of owners don’t use electric vehicles want it as an option in future EVs.
“It was a conversation with a group of engineers in one room over the course of ten years,” says Gruzen. “We now have a real product on the market.”
And as prices drop and all the early adopters buy electric cars, it could become what helps sell more Americans to electric vehicle ownership.
