Zerova Technologies, a new Taiwan-headquartered subsidiary of Phihong, made an energetic debut at this week's eMove360° Europe show in Berlin. The company previewed a prototype 480-kW charger that promises to make EV charging more convenient than ever by slashing charging time to 10 minutes. Those who don't have the full 10 to spare can zap nearly 100 miles (160 km) of battery power into their cars in less than half that time. The new Four Gun Charger can also charge four vehicles at the same time from a single unit.
Designed for both passenger car and commercial fleet charging, Zerova's new Four Gun Charger packs some serious ultra-charging power into a compact footprint, featuring independent left and right chargers on front and back of a single body. Each charger features a 16.4-foot-long (5-m) cable to aid in the logistics of parking and charging four separate vehicles. The charger supports CCS-1, CCS-2, CHAdeMO and GB charging standards and includes a digital screen designed to run advertisements.
The 10-minute full charge is based on a vehicle with a 75-kWh battery pack so vehicles with larger packs would take longer. Zerova also estimates the charger would add 93 miles (150 km) in less than five minutes, allowing some drivers to quickly power up and complete their journey before plugging in for a more complete charge at their destination.
Swiss company ABB called its four-vehicle Terra 360 the world's fastest charger when it debuted it a year ago, claiming 15 minutes for a full charge and less than three minutes for 62 miles (100 km). In May, it announced a collaboration with Shell on building a network of 200 Terra 360 chargers around Germany. Plans call for the full network to be installed by 2023.
Zerova calls the 480-kW Four Gun the new standard for "world's fastest," but it does have some very comparable competition. A few months before ABB introduced the Terra 360, China's GAC Aion showed a 480-kW charger designed to work with its super-fast-charging graphene batteries to cut charging times to five minutes for 124 miles (200 km) of range and eight minutes for an 80-percent charge. Xpeng also has a 480-kW charger design, and NIO made headlines for an even more powerful 500-kW charger this July but details were scarce.
Of course, battery and in-vehicle charging hardware will also have to be brought up to speed and these high-powered super-fast chargers will have to be installed in great numbers for those attractive charging times to mean much of anything in the real world. For now, they paint a rosy picture of a future in which charging stops will edge closer to gas fill-ups in speed and convenience.
Zerova is demonstrating the 480-kW charger prototype at the eMove360 show, where it is also showing a 360-kW variant. It plans to launch the new Four Gun Charger in Q4 2023, but it does not specify if both 360- and 480-kW variants will be available at launch.
The eMove360° Europe show began on Wednesday and runs through Friday.
Source: Zerova
