As power batteries enter the "cobalt-free" era, some companies are happy and some are sad?

Recently, Zeng Yuqun, chairman of CATL, once again sparked discussions about cobalt-free batteries by saying that "cobalt-free batteries are being developed". It has also been reported that Tesla plans to introduce a new low-cost, long-life battery in the Model 3 electric vehicles produced in China . The new battery is jointly developed by Tesla and CATL. Many industry insiders put the two pieces of news together and concluded that Tesla and CATL are about to jointly release a new cobalt-free battery. If the speculation is true, it will mark the official entry of power batteries into the "cobalt-free" era, which will undoubtedly make CATL's position as the leader in lithium batteries more stable and lock in victory in advance.

Power battery car manufacturers are competing to develop cobalt-free battery field

To talk about "cobalt-free", we must first know that there is a dispute over the routes of mainstream power batteries: one is lithium iron phosphate battery , and the other is ternary lithium battery . The former has good safety and low cost; the latter has high energy density and strong endurance. If divided by whether it contains cobalt, the former does not contain cobalt, and the latter contains cobalt. Obviously, "cobalt-free" refers to ternary lithium batteries. From Honeycomb Energy's launch of the first cobalt-free battery, to Tesla's cooperation with CATL on the supply of "cobalt-free" batteries this year, to BYD's blade battery and the news of CATL's development of "cobalt-free" batteries mentioned above, "cobalt-free" has also become an important topic in the field of power battery technology in recent years.

The "de-cobaltization" of ternary lithium power batteries ultimately needs to solve the problem of battery costs. As we all know, the full name of ternary lithium batteries is "ternary polymer lithium batteries ", which refers to lithium batteries whose positive electrode materials use ternary positive electrode materials of nickel cobalt manganese oxide (NCM) or nickel cobalt aluminum oxide (NCA). Among them, the cobalt element, which is mainly used to stabilize the layered structure of the material and improve the material cycle and rate performance, is an indispensable precious metal in ternary batteries. However, the price fluctuations of cobalt have always greatly affected the price of ternary materials, because more than half of the world's cobalt is produced in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and the excessive concentration of resources has also exacerbated the vulnerability of the global cobalt supply chain. Since the beginning of this year, with the continued deterioration of the overseas epidemic, the blockade measures and social unrest in the Congo have intensified concerns about cobalt mine production. At the same time, the border blockade policies of Zambia, South Africa and other countries have restricted the transportation of cobalt raw materials. It is expected that the export of cobalt raw materials from the Democratic Republic of the Congo and South Africa in the second quarter will decline significantly, which will have an adverse impact on the domestic import of cobalt raw materials in the third quarter.

Solving the cost problem will solve the stumbling block to the development of the new energy vehicle market. After reducing the proportion and content of cobalt in ternary lithium batteries, the cost of the entire vehicle will be reduced accordingly. The impact of cobalt price fluctuations on enterprises will also be weakened. The industry leader will change from active to passive, which will be conducive to promoting the development of the new energy vehicle market.

Although "cobalt-free" is the development direction of ternary power battery technology, and leading companies have invested heavily in technology for the future, the author believes that there is still a long way to go before it can be truly "cobalt-free". Because up to now, there is no material that can replace the stabilizing effect of cobalt. The current power battery can only reduce the amount of cobalt as much as possible, and it will not be possible to completely eliminate cobalt in the next two to three years. In fact, more companies are deploying nickel-cobalt-manganese-aluminum quaternary lithium batteries. This technical route is ushering in a "second spring" at a time when the technology is declining. Cui Dongshu, secretary-general of the Passenger Car Market Information Joint Conference, believes that the decline in subsidies for new energy vehicles has caused various new energy vehicle companies to gradually change their business direction, abandoning the pursuit of higher energy density batteries on some models and switching to relatively cheaper lithium iron phosphate batteries to reduce costs.

Competition in product lines always brings joy to some and sorrow to others. One company is "cobalt-free" while the other is "cobalt-free"; one company is sexy while the other is skinny; although leading companies have different product lines and different ways of playing, they all have to fight hard in the market and invest a lot of money in research and development. The route is important, but the result is even more important. In the end, they will all end up in the same place: accepting market verification.