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About the types of electric cars and their future

 

Types of electric cars: 'EV, PHEV and HEV'

 

 

EV (Electric Vehicle) uses only electricity from the battery as its power source without using fossil fuel like gasoline and diesel. Electric energy never generate exhaust has like carbon dioxide, and electric cars require not an internal-combustion engine but only an electric motor, which enables to simplify the vehicle structure. Because there's no need to reserve the front room for engine, a variety of creative vehicle designs utilizing that space are coming about

One more difference from the existing cars is that electric cars are silent. If you are driving an electric car for the first time, you may not notice weather the car is started or even moving due to the absence of engine sound. So some carmakers add a sound effect like engine noise on purpose.

 

 

pic : EV  

EV solely uses a battery to run a car, so battery performance is the most important issue for it. With the current technology, EV can drive up to 160km with a single charge. Samsung SDI, as we showed at the Detroit Motor Show in January, is developing a high-capacity battery that enables an EV to drive more than 300km with a single charge, expecting to be commercialized soon.

 

 

pic:[BMW PHEV Model i8] 

PHEV : PHEV : Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle

PHEV uses both internal-combustion engine and electric motor, with the battery that can be charged by external power. After charging the battery by putting a plug into the outlet, PHEV first uses battery to move until the electricity is used up, and the fossil fuel engine is then used. Usually it can drive 40 ~ 50km with electricity only

 

It cannot be said to be a solution for carbon-free vehicle because it still uses internal-combustion engine, but it is considered a bridge from fossil fuel cars to EVs. PHEV has advantages of making up for short driving distance of EV while gaining high fuel-efficiency.

 

In case of BMW i8 which is equipped with Samsung SDI battery, its gasoline engine together with electric motor can make the maximum performance of 362h.p. Its mileage is 47.6km/ℓ, more than twice mileage of the existing gasoline cars, and it can go up to 600km with a single charge. By virtue of such advantages like customer convenience, long driving distance and infrastructure, PHEV is considered the most widely used electric car in the future.

 

HEV : Hybrid Electric Vehicle

HEV is the most common and well-known electric car. Toyota Prius is a typical hybrid electric car. Like PHEV, it uses both fossil fuel engine and electric motor, but the major difference is that HEV's battery does not need to be charged from external power. When driving normally, it mainly uses engine, but while starting or speeding, it also uses electric motor as an assistant for higher output

 

HEV has a great advantage that there is no need for a driver to concern about battery maintenance; we can say "Never mind the battery". It charges the battery with its own power, no need for infrastructure like charging station. So HEVs have been widely distributed

However, according to the recent regulation plan of ZEV (Zero Emission Vehicle), U.S. is going to exclude HEV from the category of electric vehicle. ZEV is a regulation that carmakers have to sell as many electric vehicles as a percentage of annual sales, but HEV will be excluded from the "electric vehicles". So it is forecast in the market that the trend of environment-friendly car is changing from HEV to PHEV and EV

 

 

 

What is the future of electric car? HEV – PHEV - EV

 

 

 

As we have considered each type of electric car, HEV is the most widely distributed at this moment, but the ratio of electric motor to internal-combustion engine is expected to gradually increase. In fact, electric car market has recently been moving from HEV to PHEV which is chargeable, and the global carmakers are also increasing PHEV models rather than HEV

 

Although HEV still holds the major position so far due to the price competitiveness and convenience, it is forecast by electric car industry that PHEV will be overshadowing HEV in 2016 and 2017, and then EV is going to grow in earnest in 2017 to 2020.

 

Advancing battery technology, country's interests and their policies on development of environment-friendly cars, and detailed plans for expanding infrastructure of electric car charging stations, all these things make us more hopeful about the era of pure electric car.