Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

"it's time to regulate the outdoor power market."

The demand for outdoor energy storage caused by the RV and camping craze surged rapidly this summer.

In addition to the VtoL function of new energy vehicles, a variety of outdoor power products have also become the first choice for consumers to live and camp. Its rising sales have attracted many enterprises to join the track to launch large-capacity outdoor power supply.

However, the news of "outdoor power exploding while charging" on the first day of September "shocked" the entire outdoor energy storage industry. According to the latest media reports, the explosion of this outdoor mobile power supply caused serious burns to two users and made many consumers stare at it.

In fact, as early as before RV fever and camping fever, similar energy storage products mostly existed in the name of "emergency power supply" and were relatively minority. Driven by the "outdoor camping fever", some emergency power products have been revamped. New bottles have been filled with old wine, which has become a hot outdoor power supply, and prices have skyrocketed.

With the in-depth understanding of the media, a series of inside stories behind the outdoor power industry gradually surfaced. At present, most of the products on sale in the market, whether from mainstream formal energy storage brands or ordinary small factories, there are a lot of problems.

The blindfolded outdoor power industry must be managed.

"01" battery marks a lot of tricks? "like new energy vehicles, the key to determining the quality of outdoor power is the battery, but the water in it is very deep."

Xie Hailiang, who lives in Huadu, Guangzhou, is a camper and an experienced practitioner in the energy storage industry.

Compared with most ordinary RVs and campers, he is naturally a little more cautious in choosing outdoor power supplies. Xie Hailiang said: at present, the products on the market are divided into two types: ternary lithium and lithium iron phosphate.

Based on his specialty, after consulting the data on the outdoor power deflagration accident in September, he found that the cell used in the product should be ternary lithium (not lithium iron phosphate). In his view, the voltage of lithium iron phosphate monomer cell will not exceed 3.7 volts, the four monomer cells will be connected into 12 volt power supply, and the maximum charging voltage should be 14.8 volts.

"but the product in the accident reported in the news had a charging voltage of 12.6 volts, obviously a ternary lithium cell of three and 4.2 volts." Xie Hailiang points out that the thermal runaway temperature of lithium iron phosphate cells is much higher than that of ternary lithium cells, which is why outdoor power supplies using lithium iron phosphate cells are much safer than those using ternary lithium.

However, outdoor power supply pays attention to convenience, therefore, in order to pursue smaller weight and volume of products, some manufacturing enterprises will use ternary lithium cores with higher unit energy density, highlighting the lightweight and portable selling point of outdoor power supply. "but to a certain extent, it sacrifices the safety of the product."

Compared with indoor emergency energy storage, the use scene of outdoor power supply is very harsh. Most RVs and self-driving enthusiasts often put outdoor power on the car for a long time. But in summer, vehicles parked outdoors may have a temperature of more than 70 degrees. "at this time, products using ternary lithium batteries will face certain risks."

So, many of the new energy vehicles parked outdoors also use ternary power batteries, so why is there no risk?

Xie Hailiang explained: compared with the automobile's perfect BMS battery management and thermal circulation system, the heat dissipation mechanism of outdoor batteries is relatively weak, and it is even more difficult to cope with the risk of thermal runaway.

If consumers buy outdoor power, using second-hand dismantling, reuse of the old ternary lithium battery, then the risk is even greater. At present, some of the low-end outdoor power products sold in the market, the retail price can not even cover the cost of the cell, it is likely to use the second-hand cell of the car.

"I'm not saying that the old lithium iron battery is fine, but the risk is lower than that of the old ternary lithium battery." Therefore, he advises saloon cars and campers to choose lithium iron phosphate batteries when buying outdoor power products, "but it is not easy for consumers who do not know how to buy lithium iron phosphate outdoor power supplies."

According to Xie Hailiang, due to the lack of industry standards and norms, the cell identification of mainstream outdoor power is still very chaotic. Many outdoor power sources using ternary lithium batteries are marked with the words "automobile power cell", which is easy to confuse the public.

"obviously, with the popularization of new energy knowledge, more and more consumers know that lithium iron phosphate is safer, and some manufacturers will feel guilty, so ternary lithium battery products will be labeled as car-grade batteries, which is to deceive novice users." Xie Hailiang stressed that in addition to the products of small workshops, individual well-known brand goods will also do the same.

It can be seen that the outdoor power supply in the choice of cells, "marking and description" has been a lot of tricks, as a "layman" ordinary consumers, accidentally will step on the pit. In particular, the outdoor power industry's problems are much more than that.

The actual capacity of "02" has become "metaphysics"? "I cook with the newly bought outdoor power, and the electric cooker runs out of electricity after cooking twice."

Mr. Li, who loves camping, recently spent nearly 2000 yuan on an outdoor power supply. However, in the actual use, he found that the electric rice cooker advertised by the merchant that "the electric cooker can be used continuously for two hours with a power of 300 watts" can actually be used for less than an hour.

When looking for the business theory, the other party said that the two hours was only a "theoretical value", and the actual use time should be calculated according to the actual power of the user's electrical appliances. And Mr. Li found that in the product publicity page, there is indeed a "theoretical value" calculation formula marked in small print: battery capacity / electrical power.

"very similar to new energy vehicles, the current 'battery life' of this outdoor power supply has also become a metaphysics." Xie Hailiang said with a smile that the results calculated by businesses through the so-called "formula" are too inaccurate as the actual range value of outdoor power supply.

After all, most outdoor power supplies have 220 volt inverter systems, and the actual efficiency of the inverter system at this stage is about 80%. As a result, there will be about 20% power loss.

In addition, in order to protect the cell, the lowest discharge voltage of the cell has a certain standard, which will lead to a small part of the capacity of the cell can not be fully discharged.

"therefore, the outdoor power supply, which is labeled as one kilowatt-hour, can use 0.6 to 0.7 kilowatt-hours of electricity, which is not bad." At the same time, he stressed that most of the outdoor power supplies currently sold in the market are also very confused in the marking of product capacity. "most of the power supplies are marked in milliampere hours, just like portable battery."

In the eyes of many consumers, outdoor power often 100,000 milliampere hours, 200,000 milliampere hours, seems to be very big, after all, the mobile phone portable battery is only 10,000 milliampere hours.

However, based on the calculation of 3.7 volts of ternary lithium cells (3.2 volts of lithium iron phosphate), the actual capacity of some outdoor power sources claimed to be 100,000 milliampere is only 0.37 kilowatt-hours (0.32 kilowatt-hours of iron lithium).

If you take into account the loss of inverter, the battery can not fully discharge electricity, only 0.37 degrees outdoor battery, can only let the ordinary rice cooker less than an hour.

In fact, the routines on the publicity of some businesses have also caused a great gap in the actual use of outdoor power users, and created the illusion of false capacity.

"the simplest and intuitive unit should be watt-hour, but few merchants will use watt-hour scale to measure it." Xie Hailiang explained that one degree of electricity is 1000 watt-hours (Wh). If the mainstream outdoor power supply of 100,000 milliampere hours is marked with 370Wh, consumers can know that 370W appliances can be used for an hour with only high school physics knowledge.

Even if there are problems such as inverter loss, it is more intuitive for users to understand the measurement of outdoor power that can be stored than the so-called "hundreds of thousands of milliampere hours" publicity. Only by marking the resultant force, the user can choose the appropriate energy storage product according to the actual demand.

Obviously, behind the "huge" data and the "ideal value" promotion, some businesses are "mystifying" in order to increase the threshold for consumers to intuitively understand the "real specifications" of their products. fish in troubled waters at a time when outdoor power is unprecedentedly hot.

When will the "03" industry standard land? Emergency energy storage and outdoor power, originally located in a niche market, have become hot under the promotion of RV fever and camping fever.

Careful consumers have found that since the beginning of this year, energy storage companies, mobile phone portable battery brands and small power plants have all poured into the outdoor power track. Some netizens even asked: how profiteering is the outdoor power supply?

There are energy storage industry veterans and RV modification enthusiasts marked: at present, the purchase and transformation of electric energy storage power supply, the cost of a battery (1000 watt-hours), depending on materials and brands, is about 1200 to 1800 yuan.

As for the inverter system, the price of the ordinary external 1000-watt inverter is about 300 million 500 yuan, and the manufacturer's built-in inverter cost must be even lower. As for the "battery nanny" BMS, the cost is only 100,300 yuan. At present, most outdoor power supplies with less than one kilowatt-hour of electricity are sold for 3,000 to 5,000 yuan, which is indeed not cheap.

But as a "you love me" business, as long as explicit consumption, users are willing to pay for "quality", price and profit do not seem to be a problem.

Like the new energy vehicle industry, the news of outdoor power explosion caused a lot of public opinion, and many consumers began to pay attention to this blindfolded industry.

According to Tmall's May 1 consumption trend report in 2022, from April 20 to May 4, the sales of outdoor power supply on the platform increased more than two times compared with the same period last year, with a growth rate of more than 300% in the past three years.

Search for the word "outdoor power" on the e-commerce platform, and the top products are all evaluated by more than 200000, and the highest one is as high as 500000. It can be seen that in the past year, the demand for outdoor power products is exuberant.

Outdoor power supply (mobile power supply) has gradually moved from the field of emergency disaster reduction and professional energy storage to public consumption, and has quickly entered thousands of ordinary families with the improvement of consumers' living standards and tourism desire.

According to the data released by China Chemical and physical Power Industry Association, it is estimated that by 2026, the market size of the global portable energy storage industry will reach 88.23 billion yuan.

However, there are no relevant industry standards for the outdoor power industry with such a large market.

This is also the root cause of confusion in the use of materials, publicity and even price of outdoor power products. Compared with the general 3C digital, the risk of the application of high-energy energy storage product to C is not low, so more stringent standards are needed in regulation and supervision. After all, it is the life safety of consumers that is at stake for outdoor power sources that are prone to deflation.

It is worth noting that recently, it has been reported that the relevant outdoor power industry standard-"Technical Specification for Portable Lithium Ion Battery Energy Storage Power supply" will be released by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. In the future, there will be standards for outdoor power supply from production to sales to publicity.

The time left for outdoor power manufacturers to fish in troubled waters seems to be running out.

This article comes from the official account of Wechat: know Notes (ID:dongdong_note), author: Shenle, Editor: Qin Yan

Welcome to subscribe "Shulou Technology Information " to get latest news, interesting things and hot topics in the IT industry, and controls the hottest and latest Internet news, technology news and IT industry trends.