Looking at China from the Yibin Conference, the scenery and bugs of the power battery industry

From June 8th to 11th, the 2023 World Power Battery Conference was held in Yibin, Sichuan. During the conference, Yibin City was awarded the title of "China's Power Battery Capital" by the China Light Industry Federation and the China Battery Industry Association.

Yibin introduced Libao new materials and Guangyuan lithium battery projects in 2017, and began to have a power battery industry. With the introduction of CATL in 2019, the city's power battery industry began to enter the fast lane of development.

Since the first World Power Battery Conference was held in Yibin in 2022, Yibin has gradually gathered nearly 100 battery industry chain projects with a total investment of more than 210 billion yuan. This year's Battery Conference Yibin ushered in the signing of 64 major projects, with a total amount of 106.3 billion yuan.

The rapid development of Yibin's power battery industry is a microcosm of the booming development of my country's power battery industry.

China's automobile industry has always had a big and powerful dream, and China's power battery industry has taken the lead in realizing this dream. But at the same time, we cannot ignore the flaws behind the industrial scenery.

Big industry, strong enterprise

Wan Gang, Vice Chairman of the 13th National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference and Chairman of the China Association for Science and Technology, Xin Guobin, Vice Minister of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, Miao Wei, Deputy Director of the Economic Committee of the Standing Committee of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, and others all mentioned the achievements of my country's power battery industry.

Auto Business Review sums it up in the following points:

First, from the perspective of industrial scale, China's power battery industry is already the largest in the world.

In 2022, the global installed capacity of power batteries will reach 517.9GWh, a year-on-year increase of 71.8%. China's power battery industry has overcome difficulties such as rising raw material prices and supply crises, and its installed capacity reached 294.6GWh, a year-on-year increase of 90.7%, accounting for 60.4% of global installed capacity. From January to April 2023, China's power battery industry continued its rapid growth, with a cumulative installed volume of 91GWh, a year-on-year increase of 41%.

Secondly, from the perspective of company rankings, Chinese power battery companies dominate the list.

Among the top 10 power battery companies in the world, 6 are Chinese companies. Among them, CATL has been ranked first in the world's power batteries for eight consecutive years. From January to April 2023, CATL and BYD took the first and second place with market shares of 35.9% and 16.1% respectively. China New Aviation, Guoxuan Hi-Tech, Yiwei Lithium Energy, and Sunwanda ranked 6th, 8th, and 9th respectively. , 10 bits.

Third, from the perspective of technical indicators, the energy density of China's ternary lithium batteries and lithium iron phosphate batteries has reached the world's leading level.

The specific energy of China's ternary lithium battery cells and systems has reached 300Wh/kg and 200Wh/kg respectively. The specific energy of the lithium iron phosphate battery cell and system reaches 200Wh/kg and 160Wh/kg respectively. In addition, new technological achievements such as structural innovation, low-temperature heating, and thermal diffusion safety protection are also constantly emerging. Products such as blade batteries, magazine batteries, Rubik's cube batteries, and Kirin batteries that apply CTP group technology have been installed in vehicles. Sodium-ion batteries have been industrialized and solid-liquid hybrid batteries have begun to be used in vehicles.

Fourth, in terms of industrial chain creation, China has formed a complete industrial chain for power batteries, and the industrial ecology is becoming more and more complete.

All key materials such as cathode materials, anode materials, electrolytes, and separators can be produced in China. In 2022, China's lithium salts will account for 70% of global shipments, China's cathode materials will account for 70% of global shipments, and China's anode material shipments will account for more than 90% of the world's shipments, all showing overwhelming advantages.

In addition, the after-market industry chain such as power battery recycling, cascade utilization, and material regeneration continues to extend, and a total of 10,165 power battery recycling service outlets have been built, basically realizing nearby recycling.

Fifth, in terms of international development, Chinese power battery companies are steadily exploring the international market.

In 2022, Chinese power battery companies will export a total of 68.1GWh. Many battery companies such as CATL, Envision Power, Honeycomb Energy, Everview Lithium Energy, Guoxuan High-Tech, Funeng Technology, etc. have accelerated the pace of internationalization and improved the supporting capabilities of overseas car companies.

In the first quarter of 2023, in markets other than China, three South Korean battery companies accounted for 49% of the market share. CATL alone accounted for 24.4% of the overseas market share, an increase of 7.8 percentage points from the previous year.

BYD became the company with the highest growth rate among the top ten global power battery installed capacity in the first quarter, with a year-on-year growth of 115.5%. Tesla's Gigafactory in Berlin has started production, and the rear-wheel drive Model Y is equipped with BYD blade batteries.

At the conference, Qu Guochun, director of the Equipment Industry Development Center of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, released the "2023 Power Battery Industry Development (Yibin) Index" on behalf of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. Among them, in terms of the global index, there are 4 first-level indicators such as industrial scale, innovation capabilities, industrial chain completeness, and sustainable development, 10 second-level indicators such as output, export volume, and R&D investment ratio, as well as patent authorization volume, lithium resources, etc. 18 third-level indicators including recoverable volume.

After scoring by experts from all parties, in terms of the global index, China ranked first with 82.7 points, followed by South Korea and Japan, which ranked second and third with 35.6 and 35.1 points respectively.

The index shows: "China has obvious leading advantages in various fields, South Korea performs well in the field of internationalization, Japan has strong technological innovation capabilities, the United States has excellent innovation capabilities and has great potential in the field of industrial scale, and the United Kingdom has basic innovation capabilities and sustainable development. better."

The bug behind the scenery

But there is always another side to the coin. China's power battery industry also has obvious bugs behind its glamour.

First, the current inventory level in China's power battery industry is relatively high.

In 2022, China's power battery production, sales, and installed capacity will be 545.9GWh, 465.5GWh, and 294.6GWh respectively. The difference between production and installed capacity is the inventory. In 2022, China's lithium iron phosphate battery and ternary lithium battery inventories will be 148.6GWh and 102.1GWh respectively, both of which are the highest in industry history.

In February this year, China Automotive Industry Center speculated: "Assuming that the installed capacity growth rate in 2023 is 35%, the inventory of lithium iron phosphate batteries can last for about 7 months in 2022, and the inventory of ternary batteries can last for about 9 months. Inventories in the power battery industry have begun to accumulate. As the prices of upstream raw materials continue to decline, power battery manufacturers may reduce inventory pressure in the future by cutting prices. "

Second, there is a risk of overcapacity in China’s power battery industry.

Qiu Xiandong, general manager of China FAW, revealed a set of data about China's power battery industry at this battery conference: "According to incomplete statistics, from 2022 to now, more than 50 companies have announced more than 125 investment projects of more than 100 million yuan. With a total investment budget of more than 1.4 trillion yuan and a planned production capacity of more than 2,500GWh, the power battery industry has become a hot spot for technological progress and capital accumulation. "

He believes that there is a risk of overcapacity. "Now if it reaches 3,000GWh, then our installed capacity should reach 40 million vehicles. So this is also an investment risk."

At the conference, Su Bo, director of the National Intelligent Manufacturing Expert Committee, also mentioned: “To consolidate and enhance my country’s international leading position in the new energy vehicle and power battery industry, we need to continuously improve the market environment and reduce blind investment in new projects and vicious and excessive Competition leads to overcapacity and waste of resources.”

Third, China's power batteries are highly dependent on upstream mineral resources, prices fluctuate greatly, and profit distribution throughout the industry chain is unbalanced.

"my country's lithium battery industry chain supply chain relies too much on the import of mineral resources, and key resources have not yet been independently controllable. This is the biggest hidden danger for industrial development." Luo Yun, Chairman of Yibin Tianyuan Group and Honorary Chairman of China Chlor-Alkali Industry Association said at the conference.

Because of their high dependence on external markets, downstream OEMs have weak ability to control prices.

Xi Zhongmin, deputy general manager of GAC Aion, said: "We originally said that we were working for the battery factory, but now we finally understand that our entire industry is working for the material factory. The material factory not only allows us to work, but also provides long-term employment. ”