Trends in E-Mobility testing

00:00:00: (ethereal music)

00:00:01: - "Sound on. Power on.",

00:00:03: your power electronics podcast,

00:00:06: powered by PCIM Europe.

00:00:09: - Hello, and welcome to "Sound On. Power On."

00:00:12: I'm your host, David Hegarty.

00:00:14: And today, we are talking about

00:00:16: one of the important enablers

00:00:17: of the trend into electrification

00:00:19: as exemplified by the electrification

00:00:21: of vehicles on road and rail,

00:00:23: and even at sea and in the air.

00:00:26: While the motivation to decarbonize

00:00:28: that is driving this trend is clear,

00:00:30: it presents new challenges for research and development.

00:00:33: It presents new challenges for production

00:00:35: and the end of life of these new solutions.

00:00:38: And as today's discussion will show,

00:00:40: it presents new challenges for the testing

00:00:42: that accompanies all of these stages.

00:00:45: To explain how test equipment is changing,

00:00:47: I'm joined by Michael Himmels,

00:00:50: head of product management

00:00:51: at the EA Elektro-Automatik Group,

00:00:54: Europe's leading supplier of test equipment for R&D

00:00:57: and industrial applications in electromobility,

00:01:00: renewable energy, hydrogen production and fuel cells.

00:01:05: Michael's wide professional experience

00:01:07: includes responsibility as chief technology officer

00:01:10: for an entire product range of battery test systems

00:01:13: for the automotive and battery industries

00:01:16: and his time as head of R&D at EA Elektro-Automatik,

00:01:20: a position he took on in 2020.

00:01:23: In 2023, he shifted to his current role

00:01:26: as head of the product management team at EA.

00:01:29: Welcome, Michael.

00:01:30: - Hello. Welcome.

00:01:32: - EA Elektro-Automatik is celebrating

00:01:34: its 50th anniversary in 2024,

00:01:36: which means it has a history

00:01:37: that starts long before electric cars, trains and planes.

00:01:41: What's the through line that gets us

00:01:43: to the applications EA addresses today?

00:01:46: - So what we did is in the past,

00:01:49: we started with power supplies,

00:01:51: and power supply historically was a bench power supply

00:01:55: and you put voltage, current there,

00:01:57: and that's a power supply.

00:01:58: But due to the demand of that,

00:02:00: it more and more gets into testing systems.

00:02:04: It got in the path a bidirectional device.

00:02:07: So it is a power supply and the load at a time.

00:02:11: So in a test bench as an example for battery testing,

00:02:15: you can just charge and discharge a cell.

00:02:18: Doing this with a power supply is a quite easy job,

00:02:20: but what the developers like to do

00:02:23: is just doing also validation and qualification

00:02:26: of such a kind of cell.

00:02:28: So it needs to be automated,

00:02:30: you need programming interfaces,

00:02:32: you need high-speed control,

00:02:34: and you can need, also, measurement out of it.

00:02:37: So over the time,

00:02:38: the power supply came from

00:02:41: a standard bench power supply

00:02:43: to high power,

00:02:45: from high power to bidirectional.

00:02:46: And the bidirectional ones

00:02:48: get more and more into a test and measurement equipment.

00:02:51: That includes the programming interfaces,

00:02:54: the flexibility of using function generators,

00:02:57: simulation functions, getting measurement data out of it.

00:03:02: - And it's not just the functionality, is it?

00:03:04: You mentioned high power,

00:03:05: and the power levels have been increasing too.

00:03:08: - It is a very interesting portion,

00:03:10: because over time, we saw even that it initially starts

00:03:14: with the smaller inverters,

00:03:17: PV inverters, motor inverters,

00:03:19: and stuff like that being somewhere in the kilowatt range.

00:03:23: So what we are facing over time

00:03:24: now looking into the space of being used in electrical cars,

00:03:29: that we are easily talking about a higher kilowatt range

00:03:32: up to 100 kilowatts, and even more.

00:03:35: If we are looking into electrical application,

00:03:38: that's more in the space of looking into trucks,

00:03:43: semi trucks, trains, or even aircrafts.

00:03:46: We are looking into megawatt ranges,

00:03:49: and even within the megawatt ranges

00:03:50: we also facing the trends

00:03:52: into electrolyzers and fuel cells.

00:03:55: So the today's portfolio,

00:03:57: it initially started somewhere in the kilowatt range,

00:04:00: and today we completely extend it

00:04:03: to at least 60 kilowatt per a single device.

00:04:07: And we can just put them together

00:04:09: in racks and cabinets

00:04:10: and building systems, power systems

00:04:13: that end up in the range of megawatts.

00:04:16: And our today's hugest equipment

00:04:19: is in the range of four megawatts

00:04:22: - That's at the power supply end.

00:04:24: What sort of challenges have you been reacting to

00:04:26: at the other end, for the loads?

00:04:28: - So our viewing angle

00:04:30: is when we're looking into a power supply,

00:04:33: most of the time it is a bidirectional one,

00:04:35: taking the power in, taking the power out.

00:04:37: And also, for our customers in the fuel cell area

00:04:41: where usually the energy is generated,

00:04:44: we do the exact same equipment

00:04:48: also as a pure load.

00:04:50: And the load, and that's for sure,

00:04:53: in these kind of application,

00:04:54: needs to be fully regenerative.

00:04:56: So you can't dissipate such amount of power.

00:04:59: So it is just feed it back on a regenerative way.

00:05:03: - You mentioned the control setup

00:05:04: and programming interfaces

00:05:06: that makes these systems an integral part of testing.

00:05:09: What sorts of information can people get

00:05:11: outta these systems?

00:05:12: - When we are looking into

00:05:14: what the power supply is just doing,

00:05:17: then we have

00:05:18: a few test and measurement channels

00:05:22: we can just focus on.

00:05:23: This's simply just the voltage, the current,

00:05:27: but we also can calculate the power out of it,

00:05:29: the resistance out of it.

00:05:31: And we equip our power supplies

00:05:35: with the industry standard

00:05:39: high-speed field bus interfaces

00:05:42: with a high data rate.

00:05:44: And even our customers, they wanna record

00:05:47: up to a speed of a millisecond sample rate

00:05:50: and get these data out to get it into their process

00:05:55: and to get it into their data management systems

00:05:59: to get information about their application.

00:06:02: And for sure, if we are looking into the domain

00:06:05: of battery classification and validation,

00:06:09: even smaller changes

00:06:11: on the materials need to be observed.

00:06:14: So accuracy is crucial in that area.

00:06:17: The load is on the same level of interest,

00:06:21: complexity, and functionality.

00:06:24: So if we are looking into classification

00:06:27: of a fuel cell stack,

00:06:29: a fuel cell stack, by its definition

00:06:31: it's just consuming hydrogen

00:06:33: and giving us electrical energy out as the output result.

00:06:38: So if we want to just validate or classify

00:06:40: a fuel cell equipment

00:06:42: but we have the same demand and requirements

00:06:44: from the customer's side,

00:06:45: being fast in acquisition rate,

00:06:48: being accurate in getting the measurement values.

00:06:53: - How much of this's engineering driven,

00:06:55: driven by what's possible,

00:06:56: and how much of it is driven

00:06:58: by the actual needs that you see from your customers?

00:07:01: - In the end of the day,

00:07:02: it is driven from both sides.

00:07:05: So there is a huge portion of that

00:07:08: we just need to fulfill the pure spec sheet.

00:07:12: So spec sheet means, in the end of the day,

00:07:14: data acquisition rate, accuracy

00:07:17: and all these portions.

00:07:19: But there's also another side of the coin to look into.

00:07:24: So what is my total cost of ownership

00:07:27: if I looking into an engineering company

00:07:29: or into an engineering and production company?

00:07:32: So looking into that,

00:07:34: we scale our power supplies in one series

00:07:38: from 1500 watt to four megawatts.

00:07:41: And all of these equipment

00:07:42: is just acting on the same programming interface.

00:07:45: And independent of if it is unidirectional,

00:07:47: bidirectional, or load,

00:07:49: it's all the same communication interface.

00:07:51: So in a total cost of ownership approach,

00:07:55: if you're looking into that

00:07:57: and if you invest from your engineering efforts

00:07:59: into a test system and programming a power device,

00:08:03: you can scale this

00:08:04: and take this efforts that are made once

00:08:09: and scale it up from a lab equipment

00:08:12: to a user equipment in the end of the day

00:08:14: to the end of line testing,

00:08:16: all with the same interfaces,

00:08:19: all with the same programming efforts.

00:08:21: And we address even that a little further.

00:08:24: So we have fully featured power supplies

00:08:29: being a test equipment

00:08:30: equipped with a front display,

00:08:33: with touch, with the controls at the front.

00:08:37: And even we offer a similar device

00:08:40: in the same power range,

00:08:41: in the same voltage range,

00:08:43: reduced by these displays,

00:08:46: just taking only the programming interfaces into account.

00:08:50: Little bit more cost effective

00:08:51: for the end-of-line testing.

00:08:54: - And to go back, then, to the speed,

00:08:56: the sample rates, that sort of thing,

00:08:58: in terms of managing the risks

00:09:00: inherent with high-power devices,

00:09:02: are you expecting the users to program for safety

00:09:04: or is this hardwired into the device?

00:09:07: - So there are multiple levels

00:09:10: of security or safety

00:09:12: that are being needed in a test equipment.

00:09:16: And if you don't want to wanna stress your equipment,

00:09:20: if you don't want to put it in an out-of-range condition,

00:09:24: as fast as you can detect that

00:09:26: even with a faster measurement as better it is.

00:09:29: So this's one of the reasons why even in cell testing

00:09:34: it is crucial just to monitor it very precisely

00:09:37: and with a very high speed just to even detect,

00:09:40: "Okay, now my cell,

00:09:42: my component under test

00:09:43: is fully loaded or fully discharged."

00:09:46: This's one part of the story.

00:09:49: Another part of the story

00:09:50: is that we looked into what is a very typical application

00:09:55: that's our power supply used in,

00:09:57: and we even saw that in some of the applications

00:10:01: there are risk of, for example, misuse.

00:10:06: So it can even happen that someone,

00:10:08: for whatever reason,

00:10:10: they just put this cell in reverse into a test equipment

00:10:15: that might damage even the cell of the test equipment.

00:10:18: And we added to our system,

00:10:21: we added special functionality

00:10:24: even to detect a polarity reverse condition.

00:10:28: So we do the measurements

00:10:30: to give even the customer the full control

00:10:34: in any kind of condition

00:10:35: and on any kind of critical time base.

00:10:39: And for some of the basic safety elements,

00:10:42: we also added that into all test equipment.

00:10:46: - When you say you give the customer the full control,

00:10:48: you mean they have the freedom

00:10:49: to define the tests they want,

00:10:51: but also to specify the level of safety they need?

00:10:54: - Yeah, therefore we have an another set

00:10:57: of typical elements to protect.

00:10:59: So we have just some limit settings,

00:11:02: and the limit settings

00:11:03: are within our power supply and load devices.

00:11:07: So we can, for example,

00:11:08: limit either current or voltage.

00:11:12: And if you set that to a specific limit,

00:11:17: the internal supervising circuits

00:11:20: that are just proven to detect this,

00:11:22: these are even faster than a millisecond.

00:11:25: So we can just achieve, here,

00:11:28: a very high level of confidence

00:11:30: that if you put a certain limit into our power supplies

00:11:35: and a faulty device might exceed ,

00:11:37: for short circuit reasons or for whatever,

00:11:42: and it will hit the current limit,

00:11:43: we will turn off the output immediately.

00:11:46: - So that protects the equipment physically,

00:11:49: but if we take it back to the total cost of ownership

00:11:52: and given the current velocity

00:11:53: of developments in electrification,

00:11:56: do your customers need to

00:11:57: constantly replace or upgrade equipment?

00:11:59: What about protecting their investment?

00:12:02: - It's always an issue to deal with it.

00:12:05: Because if you define yourself,

00:12:07: I'm always and in every time,

00:12:09: fully backward compatible,

00:12:11: you're limiting your innovation passes.

00:12:14: So we support our customers

00:12:16: even with previous generations on special demand,

00:12:18: on special request,

00:12:19: to keep their equipment up and running.

00:12:22: So quite recently we had this case

00:12:24: where a production equipment came up

00:12:27: and need to be extended from a certain power level

00:12:30: to another power level,

00:12:31: and they need additional another four devices

00:12:34: and even those devices on special request,

00:12:36: just the customer can give us a call

00:12:39: and we talk about, and we will check if we can just build

00:12:41: those kind of devices.

00:12:42: And sometimes the components are not available anymore.

00:12:45: So we do what whatever is possible,

00:12:47: but sometimes we have to help the customer

00:12:50: just getting from one generation to the other.

00:12:53: The good point in this, here,

00:12:54: is that even our programming interfaces,

00:12:58: they involve from one point to the next.

00:13:01: And usually, with a minimum set of effort,

00:13:04: you get from one generation of programming our devices

00:13:08: to the next generation.

00:13:11: - If I can make a jump, here,

00:13:12: from the lifecycle of the test development

00:13:14: and the test equipment,

00:13:15: there's also the lifecycle of the customer's product.

00:13:18: What role can test equipment play

00:13:20: in the later life stages of batteries and the like?

00:13:24: - If you're looking into how many cars

00:13:25: out there in the world,

00:13:27: it get quite obvious

00:13:29: that at some point in time

00:13:31: we will be faced

00:13:33: with a huge, huge amount of batteries

00:13:36: that has been used in cars

00:13:39: but they're not any more suitable to be used there

00:13:42: because they have degraded,

00:13:44: the reach of the car is not as wanted,

00:13:48: and we have to distinguish what to do with it.

00:13:51: So EA invested into that area

00:13:53: and had a deeper and certain look into.

00:13:56: And what we see,

00:13:57: if you're looking onto the big pool of batteries

00:14:00: that we will see in the near future,

00:14:02: there're two option.

00:14:03: First of all is just they're good enough

00:14:06: to give them a second life.

00:14:08: So even a battery that is at a level

00:14:11: of 80% of the capacity,

00:14:13: which is not any more suitable for a car,

00:14:16: might be very, very useful

00:14:17: even for grid-coupled or home based grid-coupled storage.

00:14:22: And so, the second life qualification

00:14:24: is a very, very huge portion of the story,

00:14:27: well, we are looking into.

00:14:29: Second life qualification

00:14:31: is first of all testing the cells and the packs.

00:14:35: And that's exactly where it comes into the game

00:14:38: with the test equipment bidirectional.

00:14:40: Because we can charge, we can discharge,

00:14:42: we can measure the internal resistance,

00:14:44: we can measure the times,

00:14:46: we can measure the capacity.

00:14:48: So the EA equipment,

00:14:49: it's pretty well suited to do a second life qualification.

00:14:54: That's one half of the story.

00:14:56: The other half of the story

00:14:57: is if you're looking into the batteries

00:15:00: and the battery is too bad to give that into a second life,

00:15:03: we have to recycle them.

00:15:05: And the battery recycling,

00:15:07: it's a very good approach

00:15:08: because the material mix you get in a battery pack,

00:15:12: it's very compact, it's very heavy.

00:15:14: So you get a lot of material into a single pack.

00:15:18: But the risk in behind,

00:15:19: if you're just looking into recycling,

00:15:21: it's an energy storage.

00:15:23: So you cannot just take it and crush it,

00:15:27: because there's a lot of energy in there.

00:15:28: You have to be a little bit of careful.

00:15:30: So we looked into even this portion and realized,

00:15:35: "Okay, we need a kind of deep discharge in before.

00:15:38: Before some worker opens the pack,

00:15:41: before someone deals with scrapping that,

00:15:43: and even there we just even harvest the energy

00:15:47: that's in the pack

00:15:49: and get it back and having these regenerative loads,

00:15:53: they can harvest the energy

00:15:54: and use that locally for their equipment."

00:15:57: - Where do you see things going from here?

00:16:00: We've talked about the demands of the whole life cycle

00:16:02: for e-mobility components.

00:16:03: What's on the horizon?

00:16:06: - I think we have a few general trends

00:16:08: that are just on the horizon.

00:16:10: If you're looking into the applications

00:16:13: that needs to be electrified,

00:16:15: then as more heavy, as bigger the equipment is,

00:16:19: as more energy you need.

00:16:21: So we see a certain trend into more and more power.

00:16:26: This starts with semi trucks, trucks, buses.

00:16:30: There we are in a certain power level.

00:16:34: The next level we see

00:16:36: is everything that's around trains and aircraft.

00:16:40: Even we had first contacts

00:16:42: to people talking about fully electrification

00:16:45: of cruise trips.

00:16:46: Another trend is that more and more functionality

00:16:50: is getting into the power supply,

00:16:53: and I think that will not change in the future.

00:16:55: I think there are,

00:16:56: in future generations of power supply equipment,

00:17:00: we will see getting the power supply

00:17:02: as getting more or less like a measurement instrument

00:17:05: into higher precision,

00:17:07: higher dynamics, higher data rates.

00:17:10: And what we see is that even to the entire world situation

00:17:15: we see that the markets are a little bit more differ,

00:17:18: and that giga-factories are just popping up

00:17:22: in every country and domain.

00:17:24: And as an EA, and there's also a trend for us.

00:17:27: We need to follow a little bit,

00:17:30: for sure, the customers

00:17:31: and we will build up,

00:17:32: and we are just in the process of doing so, service centers.

00:17:37: We had those in Europe for sure,

00:17:40: there's our home base.

00:17:42: We have two of those already in North America,

00:17:44: we have a few in Asia,

00:17:46: and we've built even more.

00:17:47: - So EA is getting ready for the next 50 years.

00:17:51: - 50 years ago it was a company

00:17:54: that was very, very technically driven.

00:17:58: And we started with something that there was a need

00:18:01: and there was a technical possibility,

00:18:02: and we did that.

00:18:03: And our growth was for years and years

00:18:06: very technically driven.

00:18:08: I think for the future what will change,

00:18:11: even with further growth,

00:18:13: we need to certainly understand more

00:18:15: the markets and verticals,

00:18:17: because with these huge, huge demand

00:18:21: in entire test equipment,

00:18:23: the individual test equipment ends up with specifics.

00:18:27: So if we're looking into the PV testing,

00:18:30: the PV testing needs a functionality

00:18:32: like a maximum power point tracking.

00:18:37: If the equipment needs that,

00:18:38: we need to simulate it.

00:18:40: So years ago we started to simulate maximum power points.

00:18:44: We simulate multiple maximum power points in the future,

00:18:47: and we will see even more sophisticated testing.

00:18:50: So for the future, looking into the future,

00:18:53: what is in the near future?

00:18:55: We see that we do more dedicated applications

00:18:59: and more dedicated functionality for certain applications.

00:19:04: - Looks like EA is well positioned

00:19:05: to continue being a valuable partner for its customers

00:19:08: as electrification progresses.

00:19:10: Thank you, Michael.

00:19:11: If you're interested in any of the topics

00:19:14: that we've touched on in this episode

00:19:15: please check the links in the description,

00:19:18: where you can get more information

00:19:19: or get in touch with Michael.

00:19:21: For "Sound on. Power on.",

00:19:23: and to the PCIM Europe,

00:19:25: I'm David Hegarty and I look forward to our next episode.

00:19:29: (ethereal music)

00:19:31: - We hope you enjoyed this edition

00:19:33: (light funky music) of "Sound on. Power on.",

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