An Interactive Exploration Tool for Detailed E-Vehicle Range Analysis

Increasing the operating distance and, in particular, the accuracy of charge state/remaining range displays of electrical vehicles (EVs) are the most important and challenging goals to gain market penetration and customer satisfaction. In addition to environmental conditions such as outdoor temperature, precipitation, elevation profile, etc., the operating distance of an EV is dictated to a great extent by the energy consumption of electrical appliances (heating, A/C, headlamps, etc.). Range displays currently installed in electric vehicles do not reflect on that issue, predicting the remaining operating distance only based on the average total energy consumption from the past few trips. In order to increase the awareness of fleet operators and drivers on the influence of all the different range-influencing factors on the actual operating distance, we present with this project an explorative tool to analyze, visualize, and compare in detail real-world data from 1000s of tracks recorded within a car-sharing network. The main goals of this work are 1) to show and discuss the steps required to process and enhance recorded trips and 2) to highlight the power and flexibility of the exploration tool, shown on the example of the coherence between vehicle energy consumption and outdoor temperature.