China’s
alternative energy industry is booming, benefitting from the increasing demand
in the own country as well as worldwide. Year on year increases of Li-ion
batteries demand show numbers up to 65.8%.
The
output of alternative energy vehicles (AEV) in China is the largest in the
world, represented by cumulative sales of over 951,000 pieces in December 2016.
The Chinese government adopted in the year 2009 a plan to boost its automotive
technology and increase the efforts to lead the growing alternative energy
vehicle market to become the global leader in the manufacturing of all-electric
and hybrid vehicles in the market.
Looking
at the area of the power battery, alternative energy passenger vehicle, bus, as
well as special vehicle, the ratio of both alternative energy bus and special vehicle
is declining, while the ratio of alternative energy passenger vehicle is
rising, and the capacity surplus of power battery in 2017 will become
prominent.
As
a matter of fact, in the past few years, China has surpassed the USA in sales
of AEV and recently announced it was investing $365 billion to keep the
momentum going.
China
has rapidly grown to become one of the globally most important markets for
automobiles. As Chinese automobile, original equipment manufacturers continue
to increase their presence in international markets and international
automobile companies increase their presence in China, the Chinese consumer
will highly influence the types of cars produced.
According
to market intelligence firm CCM, industry experts are of the opinion, that the
AEV industry would reach 780,000 vehicles in the annual sales volume in 2017.
From 2019, domestic AEV manufacturers would face increasingly fierce market
competition with the impact of foreign brands, and the market would anticipate
a peak with annual sale volume of about 2.5 million.
It
is very likely, that in 2017 the market demand for alternative energy urban
distribution vehicle would reach over 120,000 vehicles, and the scale would
reach 450,000 vehicles in 2020.
Li-ion battery
China
is the largest lithium consumer in the world, while countries like Japan and
South Korean are also expanding in consumption. The global lithium consumption
in 2016 amounted to about 200,000 tonnes of lithium carbonate with a
year-on-year growth of about 14%. At the end of 2016, China’s lithium salt
capacity amounted to about 170,000 tonnes of lithium carbonate, of which
extraction of lithium from brine capacity amounted to 45,000 tonnes, and the
rest capacity was recovery of lithium from ore.
However,
key problems including durability, environmental adaptation and security need
to be tackled, when the market is rapidly growing.
Currently,
the major problems in China’s Li-ion battery industry can be found in the low
concentration, lack of technical accumulation, and innovation. According to
CCM, there are several hundreds of Li-ion battery enterprises in China, but
only several dozens of them are large in scale, resulting in serious resources
decentralisation and chaotic market competition. Consequently, China’s Li-ion
battery industry stays large but weak, unable to optimise resources allocation
and shape standardised and orderly market pattern.
The 2016
AEV Power Battery Industrial Research Report shows that in the recent two
years, the power Li-ion battery market has become the largest engine for the
rapid growth of the global Li-ion battery market. The future decade will
witness the increasingly explosive growth of global power Li-ion battery
market.
In
terms of regional market, China has become the most pulsating region in global
Li-ion battery development. Data indicated that in 2016 the total sales volume
of annual alternative energy vehicles achieved 517,000, the Li-ion battery
market scale approximated USD16.21 billion (RMB111.50 billion), and the demand
for power Li-ion battery reached USD8.79 billion (RMB60.50 billion), with a
year-on-year increase of 65.8%.
About CCM
CCM
is the leading market intelligence provider for China’s agriculture, chemicals,
food & ingredients and life science markets.
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