Award for Conductix-Wampfler: Wireless Charging of Electric Vehicles

Frost and Sullivan has presented the „New Product Innovation Award“ in the electric vehicle charging infrastructure market to Conductix-Wampfler. Thus the consultants emphasise the importance of charging technologies for the success of electric vehicles and rank wireless charging as a driver of electric mobility.

Up to now car drivers have to fill up only once a month on average. Not so with the electric car. Here the handling of the charging cable and the operator process at the charging point are necessary several times a day. Thus, user friendliness can be improved considerably by wireless charging.

According to several studies charging is more of a road block on the electric avenue. On the contrary inductive charging is not realised by the car driver at all. Just park and you are done. Everything else runs automatically. This is highly convenient outdoors in wind and weather, but also, if you have both hands occupied at the charging spot at home.

The charging starts without any operator intervention, contactless, over the air gap beneath the vehicle underbody. Controlled by settings of the driver, which can factor in electricity tariffs and needed range. The charging pad on the floor identifies the car by inductive near field communication and gets all the necessary information for the charging process also via this channel.

Accordingly wireless charging means automatically more charging processes, on the fly, with less charging current volume and charging speed, for a longer battery life. No matter how much distracted or in a hurry the driver is. Inductive charging means typically some kind of by the way charging or so called opportunity charging. In any case inductive charging runs without any interference and thus on a more regular basis and more battery friendly. Just by the way it reduces the number of fast chargings and their losses. This contributes considerably to the sustainability of the whole electric mobility. The longer battery life even more so.

Conductix-Wampfler AG has proven since many years hard every day operation with electric busses in public service, e.g. in Genoa and Turin. Inductive charging points can be integrated totally invisible as well as vandalism- and accident-proof into inner cities and parking garages.

Efficiency of wireless charging can be compared with cable and socket. Energy can even be saved under ideal conditions. Exactly as with the induction hob at home. For example charging losses by heating of cable and battery or by plug contact wear are eliminated in this way.

Yet inductive charging implies also advantages for automobile manufacturers. So, the just released plug standards of North America, Japan and Europe are different once again. Induction, on the other hand, is international. Laws of physics are globally the same.