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 DE / EN 23.10.2017     - 3 -

Advantages of wireless inductive charging

Apart from the comfortable daily use of wireless power transfer this technology delivers numerous additional advantages for the users. There are advantageous features for the user itself but also for the energy provider. Within experts the wired charging technology is a main aspect kept responsible for preventing the broad acceptance of electro mobility and wireless charging will overcome this issue.

  • Comfort

Within daily use the wireless charging provides much more comfort and easy use for electro mobility to the car driver. As the car automatically connects to the electrical grid just by parking the car, not any action is required by the driver for charging. Therefore, the familiar action of refueling a car does completely vanish. A wirelessly charged vehicle does not require a charging procedure the user is aware of. Only parking of the car provides permanent availability of energy for driving.
The value of such a comfort becomes even more obvious if charging needs to be executed under adverse weather conditions. Situations during winter are shown in the following figure.



As the wire necessary for charging usually is owned by the car driver it is unavoidable to roll-up the wire and store it inside the trunk even if it is wet and dirty. In winter this procedure leads to additional problems. As the wire heats up during charging it might melt snow on the ground. After charging ends it might get frozen again and removing the cable from the ground might get quite difficult.

  • Installation appearance in urban environment

Back in the 70th it was common to use parking meters at parking sites requiring payment at any parking space. In the meantime urban designers have avoided such installations as urban furniture disturbs the city view considerably.

       

With the installation of wired charging columns this type of unwanted street furniture returns to the cities.
This is different by using the flush mounted wireless power transfer. All technical equipment is placed underneath the street surface and is optically barely visible.
Beside the unattractive view of street furniture it has direct practical and financial disadvantages. Charge columns are as well as parking meters obstacles for the street traffic. As such the risk of collisions and other damages is quite high and causes expenses for the operators of the equipment. This is quite different by using the flush mounted wireless power transfer enabling a robust and service free operation.

  • Obstacle free installation

By using the flush mounted installation of wireless power transfer not any obstacles are involved at the parking space itself or at its surrounding. As a consequence the space can be used for other purpose in case no vehicle is parked.



Pedestrians can cross the space without watching their way, a feature being mandatory for public spaces. Also, during charging despite the vehicle itself no additional obstacle is caused due to the charging technology like it is the case by using the connection cable between a charge column and a vehicle.

  • Protection against Vandalism

Also, due to the flush mountable construction of the wireless power transfer this technology has very few starting points for vandalism. The plain surface of the primary pad build of very stable material as even trucks might drive over is very difficult to be damaged from outside. This prevents the operator from service due to damages by vandalism or accidents.
Furthermore, copper cables are quite often stolen due the value of the copper. Mechanical locks within the plug do not prevent the theft as cutting the wire from the plug can easily be done with appropriate tools. Due to the cable costs such thefts lead to considerable financial damage. The design of wireless technology prevents such thefts.

  • Electrical safety

Without any movable parts, e.g. charging cables, the wireless power transfer technology does not contain wear parts. Wear parts need to be examined and exchanged on a regular basis. Most often equipment operators transfer this effort to the user where possible. For example the user needs to use his own charging cable to transfer energy from a charge column to his car. The cable neither belongs to the charge column nor to the vehicle itself. In such a case the responsibility for examination and servicing of the cable is transferred to the private end user who might not be aware of his responsibility or might commit misjudgment. This does potentially cause electrical accidents. Ground fault circuit interrupters are installed to prevent severe injuries, but the electrical accident already happened in case these interrupters take action. Anyhow, any incident being real or pretended will lead to a service occasion as an automatic reconnection of a circuit interrupter will be treated as unsafe without investigation about the source of the incident.
As wireless technology inherits no electrical connected parts at the surface electrical risks do not occur to end users, the installation of ground fault circuit interrupters is not necessarily needed and robustness and service free operation is enhanced.

  • Availability

Due to the automatic connection of the vehicle to the grid two further important advantages arise concerning the availability of the vehicle. One is the availability for the user, the other the availability for the utility.

Due to the uncomfortable task to plug a wired electrical vehicle to the grid users tend to take this action only if it is unavoidable. This is the case if the battery is almost empty. Therefore, the battery is often stressed with deep discharge and charge cycles with negative effect to the life time of the battery which is dependent of the deepness of the discharge. With wireless charging the battery will be recharged after each travel. Thus, the battery is stressed just with the least possible deepness of discharge. Enhancement of the lifetime is a cost saving effect justifying investments to the wireless technology. Furthermore, the vehicle is always in the highest possible charging state providing the best possible availability to the user.

Utility providers are interested to use vehicle batteries to function as a controllable load in order to receive fluctuating energy at times of high green energy generation. Most often such functionality has barely negative effects to the end user as very often the charging times are much shorter compared to the parking time. (As long the battery is only used as a controllable load and is not been discharged there is also no negative effect to the life time.) Certainly such functionality is only possible, if the car is actually connected to the grid. Due to the inconvenience of plugging a car charged by wire is quite often not connected and therefore its battery capacity not usable for the utility.  cannot serve as a controllable load. Therefore, the automatic connection of wireless technology is an enabling technology for smart grid functionality of vehicle batteries.