GAC Aion Completes Its First Battery Charge and Swap Center

GAC Aion Completes Its First Battery Charge and Swap Center

GAC’s EV brand GAC Aion completed the first charging and swapping center, marking a solid step toward making Guangzhou the first “city of super-charging” in the world. The auto maker plans to boost the number of such centers to 1,000 in the future

EV maker GAC Aion announced recently that construction on its first battery charge and swap center has completed, marking the first step toward the company’s goal to build more than 1,000 such super-charge centers in Guangzhou, where it is headquartered.

In March, GAC and Aion co-invested CNY 4,960 Mn (USD 763 Mn) to found GAC Energy Ecological Technology Co., Ltd to facilitate the development and application of intelligent battery charging and swapping services.

GAC Aion plans to build 220 charge stations in 2022, and bring this number to 1,000 by 2025, averaging one station per 1.5 kilometers. This will reduce users’ time to find a station to within 5 minutes.

“The station applies A480 super-charge pile with 480kw, which can replenish a car's mileage to 200 kilometer within 5 minutes. At the same time, battery swap can be done in 2.5 minutes," GAC Aion’s general manager Gu Huinan said, adding that Aion's first battery-swap model in 2023.

He also said the station will realize full-scale self-sufficiency of recyclable clean energies through PV electricity generation and smart power storage.

Gu also revealed earlier to 21st Century Business Herald that GAC Aion will present a new generation of pure electric-exclusive platform AEP 3.0 at the Beijing Motor Show, by which time all vehicles can achieve fast charging and swapping. The show, originally set for April 21- 30, has been postponed without a new date.

In the future, Aion will present an automatic recharge and swap system Aion Robot Charger, which will realize the function of automatic valet parking and unmanned battery charge and replacement.

Currently, the penetration rate of Guangzhou's new energy vehicle market is 40.01%, ranking first in China.