Author: Wei Wen
From the car accident of star Lin Zhiying driving a Tesla, to the inability to open the door of a Lexus LM in a traffic accident, to the recent spontaneous combustion of electric vehicles, car safety issues have always attracted much attention.
In the era of fuel vehicles, strong body structure design and perfect active/passive safety configuration are important foundations for vehicle safety. Users are also accustomed to measuring product safety through C-NCAP or CAISI crash tests, and crash performance has become an important factor. An important factor in the purchase decision of some users.
Earlier, there were many models in China. Due to problems such as broken A-pillars and low scores in the crash test, which affected terminal sales, some car company R&D personnel told reporters that five-star collision has become one of the benchmarks for product design.
However, under the wave of intelligence and electrification, crash testing can no longer fully represent the level of car safety. Software and deep electrification have brought many new challenges to car safety.
Yang Tao, general manager of JD Power China Automotive Products Division, said: "Affected by objective factors such as the epidemic and chips, China's auto industry is facing multiple pressures. In an increasingly complex market environment, China's new energy vehicles have achieved rapid development beyond expectations. However, behind the contrarian high growth, it is not only inseparable from the promotion of technological innovation, but also depends on the improvement of product quality. In fact, consumers' purchase of new energy vehicles often starts with appearance, falls into technology, and ultimately attributes to quality Therefore, all kinds of new energy vehicle manufacturers still need to pay attention to quality performance, and only with the dual blessing of technological innovation and product quality can they continue to create value for new energy vehicle owners.”
Battery safety becomes the "Sword of Damocles" for new energy vehicles
"There are more and more pure electric vehicles in the basement of the community. Sometimes I also think, if a car spontaneously ignites and causes a chain reaction, what will this basement be burned." A Tesla The owner told the first financial reporter.
In 2019, a Tesla Model S in a certain community ignited spontaneously and affected many surrounding luxury cars.
At that time, a rescuer told reporters that due to poor ventilation in the basement, the temperature in the basement reached thousands of degrees, and it was difficult for firefighters to go down to the basement, so they could only pour a lot of water into it to cool down.
Since 2021, sales of new energy vehicles have risen rapidly.
According to data from the Passenger Federation, the penetration rate of the new energy vehicle market in June this year reached 27.3%, an increase of 12.7 percentage points from June last year.
Oil prices continue to rise, and factors such as multi-level subsidies from the central and local governments make more and more consumers choose new energy vehicles.
However, it is worth noting that despite the continuous increase in sales and market penetration, concerns about the safety of new energy vehicles have not declined significantly.
Recently, when the reporter visited Shanghai new energy vehicle dealers, many salesmen told reporters that battery safety is a product point that potential customers focus on. In addition, there are still many residential properties that refuse owners to install charging piles on the grounds of safety.
Qu Guochun, director of the Equipment Industry Development Center of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, said: "Power batteries are the key link." The "Key Points of Automotive Standardization Work in 2022" issued by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology shows that it is necessary to start the revision of safety standards for electric vehicle power batteries and further improve the thermal runaway alarm of power batteries. and safety protection level.
According to data released by the Ministry of Emergency Management of the People's Republic of China, the number of new energy vehicle fire accidents in the first quarter of 2022 was 640, a year-on-year increase of 32%, higher than the average (8.8%) increase in vehicle fires, with an average of more than 7 fires per day.
From the perspective of the cause of the fire, it mainly includes aging of battery components, external collision, high temperature weather, battery thermal runaway, high load, etc.
Among them, the fire caused by the use of fire and electricity accounts for more than half, and the other major incentive is the fire caused by external collision. The power battery generally installed on the chassis of new energy vehicles is not easy to detect after the collision, and the fire starts quickly and is difficult to extinguish. , the risk is high.
"The traditional five-star crash score has become more popular. Even a start-up company like NIO can get the ENCAP crash score of five stars in Europe, but battery safety is still a difficulty that most car companies need to solve or improve." Dong Jun, a researcher at a battery company, told reporters that although car companies have used many technical means to improve the safety of batteries, objectively speaking, the current electrochemical system cannot completely eliminate the possibility of battery accidents and damage to the outside of the battery pack. Lithium precipitation and dendrites caused by charging and discharging may cause risks.
Dong Jun told reporters that around 2020, in order to improve the energy density of batteries and the cruising range of electric vehicles, quite a few car companies began to use ternary lithium battery cells of the 811 system, but the stability of the 811 cells was poor; The market share of lithium iron phosphate batteries with better performance and lower cost has increased significantly; some car companies no longer use 811 ternary lithium batteries, replacing 523 and 622 ternary lithium batteries, and improve through CTP, CTC and other technologies The energy density of the battery pack.
A number of industry chain-related companies have improved battery safety in active and passive settings such as electrochemical systems, battery pack processes, and BMS management.
It has been reported recently that the lithium manganese iron phosphate batteries of CATL, Xinwangda and Yiwei Lithium have passed the battery pilot test in the first half of this year and are sending samples to car companies for testing. CATL plans to mass-produce it in the second half of this year. this product.
Huajin Securities Research Institute analyzed that, compared with the ternary cathode, lithium iron manganese phosphate has an olivine structure, which is more stable during charge and discharge, and has better safety and cycle stability than ternary cathodes.
In addition, companies such as Great Wall, GAC, SAIC-GM and other companies have added safety redundancy in battery packs.
Taking the Autoneng platform as an example, SAIC-GM has added aerogels and heat exhaust valves in the battery pack to reduce the possibility of thermal runaway.
Smart security needs urgent attention
In the Chinese market, intelligence has been strongly associated with new energy vehicles.
The accompanying problem is that, in addition to the safety of power batteries, the reliability, safety and supervision of many new functions brought by intelligence need to be improved urgently.
In the recent Lin Zhiying traffic accident, Tesla's hidden door handles have been controversial.
According to reports, according to the rescuer's recollection, he did not know how to open the door from the outside at the first time. If Lin Zhiying's son, who was sitting in the car, did not open the door, the consequences would be disastrous. In April this year, a Tesla and other vehicles also happened in Liaoning. In the fire accident after the collision, the hidden door handle could not be ejected when passers-by rescued.
A car company R&D staff told reporters that, generally speaking, the safety logic of a hidden door handle is the same as that of a traditional mechanical door handle. In the event of an accident or an airbag explosion, the door handle should be automatically unlocked or popped out; In some actual cases, the door handle did not pop up.
"In the early days, the car was an industrial product mainly based on mechanical structure. With the development of technology, the combination of automobile and electronics is getting closer and closer, which makes the function of the car more and more, and the convenience of use is getting higher and higher. .But the reliability of electronic products is usually no way to compare with the mechanical structure." The above-mentioned R & D personnel said.
At the same time, the intelligent network makes the car a part of the Internet, and network security has also become an important part of car safety.
According to a research report by JD Power, the current penetration rate of new cars equipped with intelligent network connectivity in the global market is about 45%, and it is expected to reach a market size of nearly 60% by 2025.
In 2020, the penetration rate of intelligent networked vehicles in China is about 15%, and the market penetration rate in 2025 is expected to exceed 75%, which is higher than the global market average.
This means that in the next few years, China's intelligent networked new car market will usher in a blowout.
Previously, a number of car company R&D personnel told reporters that compared with traditional mobile communication products such as computers and mobile phones, cars that are increasingly connected to the Internet are "almost streaking" in the field of network security.
In May of this year, an information security company in the United Kingdom issued a document saying that it penetrated into a Tesla vehicle through a loophole in the Bluetooth key system and could drive away the vehicle within 10 seconds; a German researcher said that more than 25 Tesla's lighting, entertainment and other systems.
The "2022 Intelligent Connected Vehicle Information Security Research Report" released by 360 shows that with the continuous increase in the number of connected vehicles, with the application of V2X technology (Vehicle to everything, that is, the exchange of information between vehicles and the outside world), hackers have increased vulnerability to vulnerabilities. The entry point to exploit.
Traditional forms of cyber threats, such as ransomware, and more vehicle-specific threats to telematics services, vehicle components, and the vehicle itself have led to an increase in the number of cyberattacks targeting the automotive industry.
In 2020, malicious attacks on related industries and platforms such as OEMs and Internet of Vehicles information service providers have reached more than 2.8 million times.
According to JD Power's survey, more than 90% (94.6%) of consumers surveyed will tend to choose car brands that focus on data security and protection of sensitive personal information.
Among them, 54.6% of consumers said they would "definitely" buy brands with strong data security capabilities.
Zhou Hongyi, the founder of 360 Company, once suggested at the two conferences to learn from the traditional car crash test concept and establish a "digital space crash test" mechanism for intelligent networked vehicles as soon as possible. Through the penetration test of the body network, the car cloud network, the car data network, the car network network and the car enterprise network in compliance with laws and regulations, the digital security problems of the whole system of "cloud, management and end" of the car are found, and the car is guaranteed to leave the factory. Safety.
JD Power believes that with the increasing attention of the society to intelligent networked vehicles, data security is becoming an important factor affecting consumers' decision to purchase a car, and it has become a "watershed" in the intelligent competition of car companies.
This means that in the future, car companies that have made achievements in data security and personal privacy protection will be more likely to establish new competitive advantages and thus gain the favor of more consumers.