A leading Japanese air conditioning manufacturer has developed a special refrigerant for electric vehicle air conditioners, which can significantly extend their range.
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When driving in extreme temperatures, the air conditioning or cabin heating system can cut a good chunk out of electric cars. However, the Japanese company Daikin, a leading local manufacturer of air conditioners, boasted a new discovery that could extend the range of electric cars by up to 50 percent.
The company boasted a special refrigerant for air conditioning systems, which should significantly reduce energy consumption. The new refrigerant has a boiling point of -40 ° C, which is about 10 to 15 ° C less than currently used conventional products, as supplied by the Nikkei Asia website.
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The air conditioning system thus needs less energy for the refrigerant compression process, which can thus be used to drive the car itself. At the same time, Daikin believes that an electric car with air conditioning using its refrigerant could have up to half the range on a single charge in urban areas of Japan. For example, cars with a range of 200 km would suddenly offer another 100 km.
Daikin has already developed a new refrigerant and is now waiting for its properties to be verified under normal operating conditions by SAE Internationall. Launch is probably expected in 2025.
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For the company, which according to sales is the world’s largest manufacturer of air conditioners and a leading manufacturer of refrigerators, this will be the first entry into the world of the automotive industry. And if the properties of the new refrigerant were to be confirmed, it could be a very successful entry.
Increasing the range of an electric car by 50 percent today usually requires increasing the capacity of the batteries, which is a complicated and, above all, expensive process. Daikin is therefore well aware that electric car manufacturers could be interested in its new product despite the higher price of the refrigerant.
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