When the warm air is turned on, the battery life is cut in half. The battery life anxiety caused by “electric dads” is still bothering car owners. In the north, sub-zero temperatures are common, which makes more and more online ride-hailing drivers who drive electric vehicles afraid to turn on the heater.Since January, "Phoenix Car Research Institute" has taken various electric ride-hailing rides in Beijing many times. After communicating with dozens of drivers, they all came up with similar responses. The battery life in winter is only 50%-70% of the sales claim.

Ride-hailing drivers are not the only ones to find discounts on battery life in winter.

In Hefei, Anhui, a car owner who purchased the Great Wall Euler Cat told Phoenix Automotive Research Institute that she drove on the national highway at a speed of 70 kilometers per hour in normal weather, and turned on the second-speed warm air at 23 degrees. In the end, she only ran 200 kilometers, leaving the rest of the car. The remaining mileage is displayed as 0. Compared with the total cruising range of 340 kilometers displayed at the time of departure, the comprehensive compliance rate is only 58%. "Fortunately, I found a public charging area before the mileage reached 0, otherwise I would have been left halfway."

A friend in the north told the Phoenix Vehicle Research Institute that in winter, the endurance of trams drops dramatically. "It looks like there are 100 kilometers left on the dial, but it's good if it can actually run 30 kilometers. Once the heater is turned on, the electric car becomes an 'electric dad', and the battery capacity is at least half." He originally planned to take time off after get off work to work part-time as an online ride-hailing company, but he gave up on this plan. "If we don't turn on the air conditioner in this weather, we will definitely get complaints from passengers."

Why is the actual battery life perceived by car owners so inconsistent with what the car companies advertise? Is it a false standard by the manufacturer, or is there another hidden reason?

"Whitewashed" experimental mileage data

To explain the problem of false standards for electric vehicle cruising range, we must first understand how manufacturers calculate the cruising range of electric vehicles.

From a global perspective, there are four types of standards for electric vehicle endurance testing.

The first is NEDC. The entire standard is conducted on a bench. Although different working conditions in urban and suburban areas are simulated, during the test, the energy-consuming configurations of electric vehicles such as air conditioners, headlights, and speakers are turned off, and the indoor temperature during the test is specified to be in the 20°C-30°C range.These will lead to great deviations between test data and actual performance.

The second type is WLTC. The total test working time is 1800 seconds, which is divided into four intervals, namely low-speed area, medium-speed area, high-speed area, and ultra-high-speed area. Different actions such as parking, braking, and acceleration must be set for each scene. In addition, the headlights, air conditioning, defrost and other equipment on the car were all turned on normally, and the vehicle speed changed irregularly during the test. therefore,The cruising range measured by WLTP is closer to the real cruising range than NEDC.

The third is the EPA battery life standard, which takes into account almost all conditions and factors in daily driving, so the power consumption is generally higher.But it’s also closest to actual battery life.

The fourth type is the CLTC battery life standard that is currently common in China. The latter was led by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and took three years to formulate by China Automotive Research Institute. It will be officially implemented on October 1, 2021. It can be called the "national standard" test condition for new energy vehicles. Taking into account the actual domestic vehicle environment, the test duration is also 1800 seconds, the mileage traveled is 14.5 kilometers, the top speed is 114km/h, and the overall average vehicle speed is 28.96km/h.Removed ultra-high speed conditions in WLTP cycle,

However, it should be noted that there was no ultra-high-speed working condition during the CLTC test, the maximum speed and average speed were also the lowest, and the entire test was in a cruising state for most of the time. In addition, the energy consumption under the parking condition of the CLTC test is 0, and kinetic energy can be recovered during driving. Moreover, the impact of ambient temperature and the use of air conditioning system on the cruising range is not taken into account, resulting in the data of the CLTC working condition being higher than that of the NEDC working condition.Therefore, car companies generally prefer to use it, but this is also the standard that is most different from the actual battery life.

So we can often see that the same car has a longer CLTC cruising range than WLTC. For example, the Ideal L9 has a CLTC cruising range of 215km, but the WLTC cruising range is only 175km, which is equivalent to a 20% discount. The Geely Galaxy L7 has a CLTC pure electric cruising range of 115km, while the WLTC pure electric cruising range is also only 90km.

If consumers only pay attention to the CLTC cruising range and do not understand the WLTC cruising range, they will naturally feel the gap between the manufacturer's propaganda and reality.

The above test methods, even the test models closest to the real environment, are very different from daily life cars. The Schrödinger's battery life between the ideal situation and the real situation naturally leaves enough room for the "virtual standard" controversy.

Competition among car companies is fierce, prompting false bids to become common

Is the problem of false standards for electric vehicle range just because of different testing standards? The answer is no.

In addition to the reason that current testing standards are too idealistic,Some car companies do intentionally lead consumers to misunderstand and even deliberately exaggerate the range of electric vehicles.

As early as March 2019, Li Xiang posted on Weibo and said: "I saw that many well-known car brands in China still use 60 and other speeds to promote their cruising range when promoting electric vehicles, and even directly paste such false cruising range numbers on the butt of the car. It feels like a great leap forward."


Screenshot of Li Xiang’s Weibo

The so-called constant speed cruising range, simply understood, refers to the mileage traveled by a vehicle at a speed of 60km/h on a straight road with no curves, no slopes, and no obstructions.Compared with "working mileage" or "comprehensive mileage", the test model of constant speed mileage is too ideal, so it has very little reference significance.

But for car companies, constant-speed cruising range can make the numbers look better. Among the first echelons of new car-making forces at that time, NIO, Xpeng, and WM Motor all used "constant-speed cruising range" as a selling point. Previously, the configuration table of Weilai ES8 stated that the constant-speed cruising range was 500km, but the comprehensive operating range was only 355km.


NIO ES8 configuration table

Several years have passed, and constant speed cruising range is still used in the promotion of some car companies.

Previously, China Traffic Broadcasting reported that the car owner, Mr. Si, purchased a Leapmo New Energy C11 Extended Range Edition at the Hongyuan Store of Leapmoor Center in Zhoukou, Henan Province on November 23, 2023. On the day he picked up the car, Mr. Si drove about 48 kilometers, and the vehicle showed power loss for more than 90 kilometers. Mr. Si reported the problem to the 4S store, and the sales representative said it was a normal phenomenon.

In the afternoon of the next day, Mr. Si used oil and drove 19 kilometers on the highway. The whole journey did not exceed 110 kilometers per hour, and the vehicle lost 39 kilometers of oil. Sales feedback said it was because the vehicle was traveling too fast, and said that only a vehicle speed of 70-80 kilometers per hour could reach the 1,210 kilometers of range advertised by Leapmoon New Energy.

After the program was broadcast, the 4S store conducted a high-speed endurance test on the vehicle after consultation with Mr. Si. The test results show that the vehicle has a pure electric range of 177 kilometers and a pure oil range of 540 kilometers. For comparison, the modified car's advertised battery life is 300 kilometers and the pure oil battery life is 910 kilometers. The actual battery life is quite different from the advertised battery life, which confirms the results of Mr. Si's previous self-tests.

At this time, the 4S store still insisted that this difference was normal, but it finally admitted that the vehicle's advertised fuel consumption of 1,210 kilometers and 5.2L per 100 kilometers,It can only be achieved at a speed of 60 yards (i.e. constant speed cruising range) and under standard temperature. In actual testing, this standard cannot be reached at all.

However, this method of beautifying cruising range for the sake of competition is not an exception.

"Phoenix Automobile Research Institute" has visited 4S stores of many brands such as Gaohe Automobile, GAC Aian, Nezha, Leapmotor, Great Wall Euler, etc. The sales staff's words are very consistent, and they basically introduce the unified cruising range according to the official website.However, there are also some more honest sales staff who will tell you privately that "the actual battery life depends on the season and personal driving habits, and a 30-20% discount is required."

From manufacturers to 4S stores, this unification of promotional caliber is essentially to attract consumers to buy cars.

After all, most consumers do not understand relatively professional terminology and knowledge such as energy consumption per 100 kilometers, battery energy density, number of charge and discharge cycles, and battery life. They may only remember the most intuitive number - cruising range. For this reason, car companies can only do what they like and try every means to make this number higher.On the sales side, they deliberately cooperated to avoid test conditions, test working conditions, etc. In the end, the numbers looked good and sales increased, but consumers were also injured.

There are also many similar complaints on Zhihu, Xiaohongshu, Weibo and other platforms.



Netizens complain about tram battery life


There are so many complaints that the problem is difficult to solve in the short term

A search by "Phoenix Auto Research Institute" found that on the Black Cat complaint platform, well-known manufacturers such as Chery, Great Wall, Geely, Xpeng, BYD, Wenjie, etc. have all been complained by consumers about false battery life standards.


Black cat screenshot

On the well-known car complaint website Car Quality Online, many netizens also complained about the issue of false mileage standards. "Phoenix Automotive Research Institute" noticed that some netizens posted that the false mileage standard of the new Xpeng G9 car was seriously inconsistent. The post pointed out: After charging this Sunday, the meter showed a WLTP mileage of 401 kilometers. As of Thursday, the remaining mileage is 181 kilometers, the consumption is 220 kilometers, and the actual driving range is 122 kilometers. According to the WLTP 450 kilometers standard, the actual range is 55% off.

The netizen also listed the specific usage conditions: During the period, the temperature in Beijing was about -5°C. The driving mode was always single driving, the comfort mode was used, the kinetic energy recovery level was high, the air conditioner was always on two levels of air volume, the seat and steering wheel were heated on one level, and the normal music volume was 10%. In the end, the actual battery life of Xpeng G9570max was only 247.5 kilometers, which is far from the officially promoted CLTC battery life of 570 kilometers and WLTP battery life of 450 kilometers.

It should be emphasized that the above-mentioned cases cannot be used to determine that the car company intentionally cheated.

As mentioned above, from the perspective of a car company, it is to set all conditions to optimal, measure a data that meets your ideals, and finally get a battery life result that is difficult to reproduce in real life, using this as an exclusive promotional selling point.

But in real life, energy consumption is affected by many aspects, including temperature, air conditioning, vehicle speed, road conditions, accelerator strength, tire wear, and even the metaphysical "feel". The combination of these factors will objectively cause the cruising range to become a "virtual standard".

At present, although our country has professional testing methods, it lacks corresponding standards and authoritative testing methods for the identification of false cruising range standards.Chu Jinsheng, an expert on automobile rights protection on China.com, said in an interview with China Traffic Broadcasting: "Currently there is no standard regulation that stipulates what percentage is considered a false standard by the manufacturer." As a result, it has become very difficult for consumers to defend their rights in this regard.

Virtual marking is never a new thing. In the era of oil trucks, false marking also existed. In actual use, consumers are often unable to meet the fuel consumption standards announced by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.

The problem is that oil trucks replenish energy very quickly, and oil trucks are generally not as delicate as electric cars. The level of their virtual signs and the impact they bring are much smaller than electric cars.

It is gratifying that some car companies are relatively "conscientious" in providing mileage calculation methods on their official websites. The variables cover driving speed, outside temperature, wheel hub size, air conditioning switch, etc. However, for complex and changeable actual situations, it is far from enough.


Based on this, consumers should also have some advanced knowledge, such as understanding what type of test the manufacturer uses to display the cruising range, and fully consider whether it matches their daily usage scenarios.

In addition, policies and regulations also need to be improved as soon as possible to supervise and guide the official data to be closer to the real data; in terms of publicity and guidance, car companies should also take the initiative to indicate the test results under which certification conditions the maximum cruising range was obtained. At the same time, they should also disclose to consumers that during actual driving, factors such as ambient temperature, road conditions, and vehicle air conditioning may cause the actual maximum cruising range to be lower than the test data under certification conditions, so that consumers have full rights to know.

Hopefully, in the near future, cruising range will no longer be a pain point for pure electric vehicles, and then the era of safe electric travel will truly come.