In the past two years, the production and sales of new energy vehicles in China have grown rapidly. With the increasing density of urban charging piles, it is already very convenient for electric vehicles to be charged in urban areas, but long-distance travel will still make many owners anxious about replenishment. Recently, the Ministry of Transport, the National Energy Administration, the State Grid Corporation of China, and China Southern Power Grid Co., Ltd. jointly issued the "Action Plan for Accelerating the Construction of Charging Infrastructure Along Highways", which pointed out that by the end of 2022, highway service areas in areas other than cold and high altitudes across the country can provide basic charging services; By the end of 2023, qualified ordinary national and provincial trunk highway service areas (stations) will be able to provide basic charging services.

According to data previously released by the Ministry of Transport, as of April this year, 13,374 charging piles have been built in 3,102 service areas of China's 6,618 highway service areas. According to data released by the China Charging Alliance, as of July this year, China's public charging piles have reached 1.575 million. However, the total number of charging piles is still far from enough compared to the current number of new energy vehicles.

As of June this year, the cumulative number of charging infrastructure in the country was 3.918 million units. During the same period, China's new energy vehicle ownership crossed the 10 million mark. That is, the ratio of charging pile to vehicle is about 1:3. According to international general requirements, to completely solve the problem of inconvenient charging of new energy vehicles, the vehicle pile ratio should reach 1:1. It can be seen that compared with the actual demand, the current popularity of charging piles still needs to be accelerated. There are even relevant studies pointing out that by 2030, the number of new energy vehicles in China will reach 64.2 million. According to the construction goal of 1:1 vehicle pile ratio, there will still be a gap of about 63 million charging piles in China's charging pile construction in the next 10 years.

Of course, the larger the gap, the greater the development potential of the industry. Statistics show that the size of the entire charging pile market will reach about 200 billion yuan. At present, there are more than 240,000 charging pile-related enterprises in China, of which more than 45,000 are newly registered in the first half of 2022, with an average monthly growth rate of 45.5%. It can be expected that since new energy vehicles are still in the stage of rapid popularization, the activity of this market will continue to increase in the future. This can be regarded as another emerging supporting industry spawned by the new energy vehicle industry.

The importance of charging piles to new energy vehicles is like gas stations to traditional fuel vehicles. As early as 2020, new energy vehicle charging piles were included in the scope of new national infrastructure together with 5G base station construction, ultra-high voltage, intercity high-speed railway and urban rail transit, and a series of support policies have been introduced for the charging pile industry from the national to the local. Therefore, the popularity of charging piles has greatly accelerated in the past two years.

However, with the rapid development of the industry, the existing charging pile infrastructure still has problems to varying degrees in layout, operation and maintenance, and other aspects. For example, the installation distribution is uneven, some areas may be saturated, but some areas have few numbers and outlets. And private installation of charging piles is also prone to resistance from residential properties. These factors make the actual utilization efficiency of existing charging piles fail to be maximized, and also objectively affect the experience of new energy vehicle owners. At the same time, the insufficient penetration rate of charging piles in highway service areas has also become a prominent constraint affecting the "long journey" of new energy vehicles. This relevant action plan puts forward clear requirements for the construction of highway charging piles, which is indeed very targeted.

In addition, it is necessary to have a clear understanding that the charging pile industry includes multiple links such as design and development, production system, sales and maintenance, etc., not to say that it will be once and for all after installation. For example, regarding the "rotten" after the installation of the charging pile, the phenomenon of being destroyed is exposed from time to time. On the whole, the characteristics of "heavy construction and light operation" in the development of charging piles are still prominent. Behind this involves a very important issue, that is, while many companies have seized this blue ocean market, the lack of relevant industry standards has led to the overall efficiency of the charging pile industry to be improved. Some deputies suggested that regulations on the construction and maintenance of charging stations and charging piles should be formulated as soon as possible, and the construction and maintenance of charging stations and charging piles should be standardized. At the same time, the interface standards and charging standards of charging piles should be improved.

Since the entire new energy vehicle industry is still in a stage of rapid development, consumer requirements are also constantly improving, and the charging pile industry also needs to be continuously upgraded. A typical problem is that the initial charging piles are mainly based on "slow charging", but with the rapid increase in the penetration rate of new energy vehicles, the demand for "fast charging" in society is increasing. Ideally, charging new energy vehicles should be as convenient as refueling fuel vehicles. In this regard, on the one hand, enterprises need to accelerate the progress of technology research and development and increase the penetration rate of "fast charging" charging piles; On the other hand, it is also required that the supporting power guarantee keep pace with the times. That is to say, in the face of the current rapidly rising demand for new energy vehicle charging, charging piles must not only ensure speed, but also cannot ignore quality in the process of popularization. Otherwise, it will not only affect the actual service capacity, but also likely to cause waste of resources. In particular, because of the existence of various supports and subsidies, it is necessary to prevent the disorderly development phenomenon of sediment and speculation. In this regard, there are actually lessons learned in many industries and must be vigilant.

The higher the popularity of charging piles as supporting infrastructure, the more conducive it is to the development of the new energy vehicle industry. To some extent, when charging piles become ubiquitous, it can not only alleviate the anxiety of existing new energy vehicle owners, but also help increase the confidence of the whole society in new energy vehicles, because it will bring more "sense of security", thus playing an "advertising" role. Therefore, many places have clearly proposed that the construction of charging piles should be moderately ahead. It should be said that from the current development plan and realistic development momentum, the charging pile industry is indeed ushering in a spring. However, in this process, how to grasp the relationship between speed and quality is still worth paying attention to.