CLTC (driving Cycle)
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The China Light-Duty Vehicle Test Cycle (CLTC) () is a
driving cycle A driving cycle is a series of data points representing the speed of a vehicle versus time. Driving cycles are produced by different countries and organizations to assess the performance of vehicles in various ways, for example, fuel consumption ...
standard introduced by the
government of China The government of the People's Republic of China is based on a system of people's congress within the parameters of a unitary communist state, in which the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) enacts its policies through people's congresses. ...
to measure the
energy consumption Energy consumption is the amount of energy used. Biology In the body, energy consumption is part of energy homeostasis. It derived from food energy. Energy consumption in the body is a product of the basal metabolic rate and the physical acti ...
, driving range and emissions of light-duty vehicles, including both
internal combustion engine An internal combustion engine (ICE or IC engine) is a heat engine in which the combustion of a fuel occurs with an oxidizer (usually air) in a combustion chamber that is an integral part of the working fluid flow circuit. In an internal comb ...
(ICE) vehicles and
electric vehicles An electric vehicle (EV) is a motor vehicle whose propulsion is powered fully or mostly by electricity. EVs encompass a wide range of transportation modes, including road vehicle, road and rail vehicles, electric boats and Submersible, submer ...
(EV). It was developed with a goal to align vehicle testing with Chinese real-world driving conditions, and to replace the
New European Driving Cycle The New European Driving Cycle (NEDC) was a driving cycle, last updated in 1997, designed to assess the emission levels of car engines and fuel economy in passenger cars (which excludes light trucks and commercial vehicles). It is also refe ...
(NEDC) in China. The CLTC was first adopted into regulation by the Chinese
Ministry of Industry and Information Technology The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) is the sixth-ranked executive department of the State Council of the People's Republic of China. It is responsible for regulation and development of the postal service, Internet, wireles ...
(MIIT) in October 2021 under the national standard "GB/T 38146.1-2019, China Automotive Test Cycle Part 1: Light Vehicles". It allows the manufacturer of
battery electric vehicles A battery electric vehicle (BEV), pure electric vehicle, only-electric vehicle, fully electric vehicle or all-electric vehicle is a type of electric vehicle (EV) that uses electrical energy exclusively from an on-board battery pack to power ...
to report
all-electric range All-electric range (AER) is the maximum driving range of an electric vehicle using only power from its on-board battery pack to traverse a given driving cycle. In the case of a Battery electric vehicle (BEV), it means the maximum range per rech ...
and energy consumption based on either the
New European Driving Cycle The New European Driving Cycle (NEDC) was a driving cycle, last updated in 1997, designed to assess the emission levels of car engines and fuel economy in passenger cars (which excludes light trucks and commercial vehicles). It is also refe ...
(NEDC) or CLTC. The CLTC testing accounts for the country's higher congestion levels with more frequent stop-and-go and lower speed limits, which lead to increased low-speed driving and longer idling times that benefits electric vehicles. , the CLTC standard is used in China alongside the NEDC and the Worldwide Harmonised Light Vehicles Test Cycle (WLTC). Outside China, the CLTC has drawn criticism for being perceived as less rigorous than other standards such as the WLTP and EPA in electric vehicle range estimates.


History

In 2009, the Worldwide Harmonized Light-Duty Driving Test Cycle (WLTC) was introduced in 2009 by the Working Party on Pollution and Energy Transport Program (GRPE) under the
United Nations Economic Commission for Europe The United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (ECE or UNECE) is an intergovernmental organization or a specialized body of the United Nations. The UNECE is one of five regional commissions under the jurisdiction of the United Nations Econom ...
(UNECE). It was based on real driving data from six regions: the US, South Korea, Japan, India, the EU, and Switzerland. However, the WLTC did not include data from China, limiting its applicability in reflecting Chinese driving conditions. In response, in 2015 the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) started the China Automotive Test Cycle (CATC) project at a cost of more than 100 million RMB, with the aim of creating a more representative driving cycle for China, addressing the limitations of existing driving cycles such as the NEDC, which did not accurately reflect real driving conditions in China. Initially, the NEDC was used for vehicle type approval tests (
homologation Homologation (Greek language, Greek ''homologeo'', ὁμολογέω, "to agree") is the granting of approval by an official authority. This may be a court of law, a government department, or an academic or professional body, any of which would n ...
) in China, but as vehicle ownership and traffic patterns evolved, the gap between test results and actual fuel consumption increased. The China Automotive Technology & Research Center (CATARC) took the lead in organizing the joint research, which also involved the
Ministry of Finance A ministry of finance is a ministry or other government agency in charge of government finance, fiscal policy, and financial regulation. It is headed by a finance minister, an executive or cabinet position . A ministry of finance's portfoli ...
, the Ministry of Environmental Protection, the National Standards Committee and the
Chinese Academy of Engineering The Chinese Academy of Engineering (CAE, ) is the national academy of the People's Republic of China for engineering. It was established in 1994 and is an institution of the State Council of China. The CAE and the Chinese Academy of Sciences a ...
. To develop the CLTC, extensive data was collected from over 3,700 light-duty vehicles across 40 cities in China, considering various factors such as traffic volume and road conditions. The resulting driving cycle is designed to capture typical urban and rural driving behaviors. Its effectiveness was evaluated by comparing its characteristics with those of other driving cycles, including the NEDC,
FTP-75 The EPA Federal Test Procedure, commonly known as FTP-75 for the city driving cycle, are a series of tests defined by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to measure tailpipe emissions and fuel economy of passenger cars (excluding l ...
, and the WLTC. The CLTC has longer transient cycles and higher idle ratios, which more closely reflect congested traffic conditions in Chinese cities. Fuel consumption analyses showed that the CLTC's rates are approximately 13.5% higher than results from testing during vehicle homologation in China. On October 1, 2021, the MIIT issued the "Notice on Matters Related to the Calculation of Double Credits in 2021". This notice mandates that battery electric passenger vehicles have the option to state their power consumption and driving range based on either the NEDC or the CLTC. Meanwhile, internal combustion vehicles and
plug-in hybrid A plug-in hybrid electric vehicle (PHEV) or simply plug-in hybrid is a type of hybrid electric vehicle equipped with a rechargeable battery pack that can be directly replenished via a charging cable plugged into an external electric power so ...
passenger vehicles must state their fuel consumption, power consumption, and electric driving range according to the WLTC. Additionally, the national standard "Passenger Car Fuel Consumption Limit" (GB 19578-2021) issued in February 2021, states that by 2025, the test conditions for internal combustion passenger cars and plug-in hybrid passenger cars will transition from the NEDC to the WLTC. The standard was quickly adopted by manufacturers. On 8 October 2021, Tesla China updated the range for its Model 3 Performance on its official website, increasing it from to . This change coincided with the new battery capacity of 78.4 kWh, which is only 1.6 kWh larger than the previous model's 76.8 kWh. The improvement in range was attributed to the transition from the NEDC to the CLTC.


Category

The CLTC is standardized by the national standard "GB/T 38146.1-2019, China Automotive Test Cycle Part 1: Light Vehicles", which defines two chassis dynamometer driving cycles, one for passenger cars and another for light commercial vehicles: * CLTC-P: China light-duty vehicle test cycle-passenger cars (乘用车行驶工况) * CLTC-C: China light-duty vehicle test cycle-commercial vehicles (轻型商用车行驶工况) The China Automotive Test Cycle also includes the China Heavy-Duty Vehicle Test Cycle, consisting of CHTC-B, CHTC-C, CHTC-D, CHTC-LT, CHTC-HT, and CHTC-TT.


Test procedure

The CLTC is designed to simulate typical urban and rural driving conditions in China. Chinese cities generally experience higher congestion levels, leading to a greater proportion of low-speed driving, frequent stops and longer idling times. The maximum speed limit in China is set at . The CLTC testing includes lower average speeds, frequent stops, and more dynamic driving profiles, which is claimed to more closely reflect the realities of China's traffic patterns compared to the NEDC or the
Worldwide Harmonised Light Vehicles Test Procedure The Worldwide Harmonised Light vehicles Test Procedure (WLTP) is a global driving cycle standard for determining the levels of pollutants, carbon dioxide, CO2 emission standards and fuel efficiency, fuel consumption of conventional internal combus ...
(WLTP). This standard benefits electric vehicles, which under this cycle are able to produce higher driving range numbers compared to the NEDC and WLTP. The CLTC testing involves three driving phases: slow, medium, and fast, with a total duration of 30 minutes and a vehicle mileage of on a
dynamometer A dynamometer or "dyno" is a device for simultaneously measuring the torque and rotational speed ( RPM) of an engine, motor or other rotating prime mover so that its instantaneous power may be calculated, and usually displayed by the dyna ...
. It is based on a study of 3,832 vehicles from 41 cities, incorporating low-frequency dynamic data that reflects typical traffic conditions in China. Compared to the WLTP adopted in Europe, the CLTC involves more frequent stops, accelerations, decelerations, and simulates urban traffic congestion with a lower speed limit of . The extra-high-speed condition from the WLTP has been removed, but the total cycle duration remains unchanged at 1,800 seconds. The idling time of the CLTC testing accounted for 22.1% of the entire cycle time, which is close to the idling duration of the NEDC testing.


Comparison with other driving cycles

The following table presents a comparison of test results conducted by the Tianjin Automotive Research Institute of a sampled electric vehicle prior to the introduction of the CLTC. The following table is a comparison of the test cycle of CLTC-P compared to other test cycles.


Limitation and criticism

The CLTC has some limitations, such as how it accounts for energy consumption from
air conditioning Air conditioning, often abbreviated as A/C (US) or air con (UK), is the process of removing heat from an enclosed space to achieve a more comfortable interior temperature, and in some cases, also controlling the humidity of internal air. Air c ...
or
in-car entertainment In-car entertainment (ICE), or in-vehicle infotainment (IVI), is a collection of hardware and software in automobiles that provides audio or video entertainment. In car entertainment originated with car audio systems that consisted of radios and c ...
systems during testing. During hot or cold weather, electric vehicles need extra energy for air conditioning, which reduces their driving range. Additionally, using entertainment systems may further increase energy consumption, affecting the overall range. The CLTC has also faced criticism internationally for being perceived as "less stringent", "generous", or "unrealistic" compared to the WLTP and EPA standards when measuring electric vehicle range. Critics argue that the CLTC may overestimate vehicle range compared to these other testing protocols, which are widely regarded as more rigorous in assessing real-world driving conditions.{{Cite web , last=Breevoort , first=Leo , date=2023-05-20 , title=The main misconception about the CLTC range , url=https://carnewschina.com/2023/05/20/the-main-misconception-about-the-cltc-range/ , access-date=2024-10-13 , website=CarNewsChina.com , language=en-US


See also

*
New European Driving Cycle The New European Driving Cycle (NEDC) was a driving cycle, last updated in 1997, designed to assess the emission levels of car engines and fuel economy in passenger cars (which excludes light trucks and commercial vehicles). It is also refe ...
*
Worldwide Harmonised Light Vehicles Test Procedure The Worldwide Harmonised Light vehicles Test Procedure (WLTP) is a global driving cycle standard for determining the levels of pollutants, carbon dioxide, CO2 emission standards and fuel efficiency, fuel consumption of conventional internal combus ...
(WLTP) *
FTP-75 The EPA Federal Test Procedure, commonly known as FTP-75 for the city driving cycle, are a series of tests defined by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to measure tailpipe emissions and fuel economy of passenger cars (excluding l ...


References

Emission standards Guobiao standards