Go easy on the gas — new study suggests a smooth EV driving style is simplest way to prolong its battery life | Daily Reports Online
- New analysis links aggressive driving to premature EV battery degradation
- Chinese researchers found optimizing driving style can prolong battery life
- Researchers used AI modeling to link driving style to battery wear
Researchers at Shanghai Dianji University in China have linked aggressive driving styles to premature EV battery degradation, concluding that optimizing driving style is an “effective way to alleviate the aging of power batteries and extend cycle life”.
The researchers pored over a year’s worth of driving data from 15 EVs in Guangzhou during 2022, gathering data every 10 seconds on metrics such as speed, current and state of charge to determine the overall smoothness of acceleration and deceleration, as well as the overall intensity of driving.
Once gathered, the data was compiled to create profiles, with the smoothest category dubbed ‘eco-driving’ and the most aggressive category housing those scenarios where the vehicle was pulling very high electrical current from the battery, and included situations such as repeated high-torque demands at relatively low speeds, according to Science Alert.
But this is where it gets clever, because instead of simply looking for correlations between factors like acceleration and battery stress, the researchers developed machine learning frameworks that could separate driving behavior from other factors that can adversely affect long-term battery performance, such as temperature, the battery’s state of charge and time spent idling.
While the paper is clear to point out that the dataset didn’t have directly measured long-term battery state-of-health or capacity-fade data, instead using a model to predict long-term degradation, it did find that the most aggressive driving category produced a battery aging rate 18.4 times higher than the most economical driving style.
Longer term, the research group’s battery-aging model estimated a 53.22% capacity fade after 1,000 cycles for the most aggressive driving style, compared with 21.15% for the most economical.
This doesn’t necessarily mean that the fastest drivers are going to wear out their EV batteries quicker, but it could suggest those that regularly launch their electric vehicles away from traffic lights or constantly plant the throttle only to slam on the brakes a few seconds later could be putting substantially more stress on their battery packs.
Analysis: too many variables for concrete evidence
Admittedly, I’m not claiming to be on the same academic level as the researchers from Shanghai Dianji University, but it feels like there are a lot of confounding variables that could also speed up battery degradation.
The way in which an EV is charged has often been cited as a potential contributing factor to premature battery degradation, although a study by Recurrent (via CleanTechnica) found that there was no significant difference in range degradation between Teslas that fast charge more than 90% of the time and those that fast charge less than 10% of the time.
However, this could be a different case entirely if an EV owner was to exclusively charge via 400kW or higher outlets, as opposed to Tesla’s 250kW max charging speeds.
Similarly, factors like vehicle load, the terrain and gradient of roads regularly used by owners and even traffic conditions could all be contributing factors to diminishing range over time.
That said, it’s generally wise to drive as smoothly as possible, both in order to maximize EV range and keep your passengers from your spoiling your box-fresh EV interior.
But now, long-term battery health could also be a consideration for a lighter approach to the accelerator pedal.
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