Recently, according to the statistical analysis of the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers, from January to November 2021, the production and sales of new energy vehicles in China continued to reach a new high, with a cumulative output of more than 3 million vehicles and sales of nearly 3 million vehicles. In November, the market penetration rate of new energy vehicles was 17.8%, which continued to be higher than that of the previous month, of which the market penetration rate of new energy passenger vehicles reached 19.5%. In the new stage of the vigorous development of new energy vehicles, it is necessary to recognize the great significance of industrial development and future vision.
Highly understand the great significance of the development of China's new energy automobile industry
From the perspective of the automobile industry, the development of new energy vehicles has made China a big step closer to becoming an automobile power. At the beginning of the 21st century, during the important period of transformation of the automobile industry, China creatively combined the development of new energy vehicles with enhancing industrial competitiveness, ensuring energy security, improving air quality and responding to climate change. Since the "Ten Cities and Thousand Vehicles" project, the development of New Energy Vehicles in China has gone through more than ten years and has made remarkable achievements. From the perspective of market size, China has become the world's largest electric vehicle market, with cumulative sales of electric passenger cars accounting for 45% of the world, and the sales of electric buses and electric trucks accounting for more than 90% of the world; the number of public charging piles that have been built exceeds that of the United States, Europe and Japan combined; with leading mass-produced power battery technology, it is the most active region in the world for the innovation of electric mobility business models. In the process of global automobile electrification, China has taken the first step and achieved a first-mover effect, which has greatly enhanced the self-confidence of enterprises and the public.
From the perspective of innovation strategy, due to the integration of a large number of "extra-automobile" technologies, the automobile revolution has led to an unprecedented technological innovation movement in the history of China's industrial development. As a symbol of the national industrial system, the automobile is an important scene for the application of new technologies. Automotive electrification combines advanced materials R&D applications with high-end parts manufacturing, and promotes the upgrading of batteries, motors, and electronic control technologies. The automobile is one of the most important application scenarios of a new generation of information technology, artificial intelligence, 5G, Internet of Things, etc., a large number of "outside the car" technology is applied to the car, on the one hand, the intelligent development of the car has been achieved, on the other hand, the intelligence of the car has become the application stage of a large number of cross-border technologies, and the car has become an important force driving other industries to accelerate innovation.
From the perspective of energy strategy, the automobile revolution has effectively promoted the energy revolution. Now China is facing a third energy revolution in the transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy. It is estimated that in 2035, wind and solar power generation will account for more than 80% of the installed capacity and more than 40% of the power generation, and the cost of photovoltaic power generation and wind power can be reduced to 0.1 yuan -0.2 yuan / kWh。 The problem facing the current new energy revolution is that the power generation cost of photovoltaic and wind power itself is low, but the cost of utilization is still high, of which energy storage is the main bottleneck. In 2030, the number of electric vehicles is expected to exceed 80 million, and the energy storage potential will reach 5800GWh. New energy vehicles composed of electrochemical energy power systems are important energy storage support for the development of renewable energy, and the ongoing automobile revolution is greatly promoting energy transformation and energy revolution with the super-large-scale energy storage capacity provided.
From the perspective of the dual-carbon strategy, the development of new energy vehicles will help to achieve carbon peaking and carbon neutrality in advance. With the increase in the proportion of renewable energy generation, the carbon emissions per unit mileage of pure electric passenger cars will drop to 20g/km in 2035, which will be more than 70% lower than in 2021. By 2035, new energy vehicles will achieve carbon emission reduction of about 200 million tons in the field of road transportation, with significant carbon reduction benefits.
Important experience in the development of China's new energy automobile industry
Respect the law of technological innovation, and handle the relationship between multiple technical routes. During the "Twelfth Five-Year Plan" period, after studying the development trend of various technical routes, long-term energy conservation and emission reduction benefits, and thinking about how to cultivate competitive advantages, China gradually clarified the "pure electric drive" technology transformation strategy and deepened the "three vertical and three horizontal" research and development layout. By the end of the "13th Five-Year Plan", China firmly grasped the trend of automobile intelligence, focusing on strategic deployment in the direction of intelligent electric vehicles.
Respect the spirit of enterprise innovation, and handle the relationship between traditional cars and new car-making forces. China has broken down the traditional policy and institutional obstacles of the automobile industry and gradually established an industrial policy system conducive to technological progress and enterprise innovation. Especially in the early stage of electrification development, allowing "cross-border car manufacturing" fully absorbs the wisdom outside the industry and further stimulates the vitality of the industry. At the same time, through a series of policy incentives and constraints, to promote the transformation of traditional automobile companies to electrification, some large automobile companies, especially some large state-owned automobile enterprises, continue to increase investment in the field of new energy vehicles, which has promoted the overall upgrading of the national automobile industry.
Follow the law of the development of emerging industries and handle the relationship between the government and the market. In the early stage of the development of the new energy automobile industry, there were problems of products, technology immature and infrastructure were not synchronized, and consumers' understanding of products was not sufficient. Demonstration pilots, government subsidies, and public fleet procurement have become the "troika" driving the rise of market scale. With the gradual formation of the new energy vehicle market, China has not consistently let the industry lie on the policy hotbed, but has quickly shifted to the regulatory standards oriented to energy conservation and emission reduction and the dual-credit policy oriented to market incentives. Policy-driven and market mechanisms continue to stimulate industrial vitality, providing valuable reference for other emerging industrial structural reforms.
Adhere to multi-departmental collaboration and deal with collaborative management issues in the process of industrial development. New energy vehicles have changed the scope of industry and management, China has formed a horizontal coordination, vertical penetration of the management mechanism, in the industry, science and technology, finance and taxation, infrastructure, transportation, energy and other levels, all departments work together, played a baton role. Multi-sectoral coordination promotes macro strategy formulation and top-level design, and solves major problems and bottlenecks in the development process through inter-ministerial joint meetings and other systems; each department formulates departmental plans and supporting policies and measures according to the division of functions, paying attention to coordination with the goals of related departments; local governments actively implement and form strong support at the level of promotion and application and industrial investment.
Greet global competition with an open attitude and handle the relationship between independent innovation and open innovation. The market potential of China's new energy automobile industry and the restrictions on foreign ownership have been gradually relaxed, setting off a wave of global new energy vehicle and parts enterprises investing in China. Global investment in the new energy vehicle industry is expected to be about $300 billion by 2025, of which 45% will flow to China. The continuous improvement of the degree of opening up to the outside world will further enrich China's selection of new energy vehicle products and also demonstrate the confidence of the Chinese government in local technical strength.
The future vision of China's new energy vehicle development
On the basis of electrification, we are determined to achieve greening. When the car is electrified, the cleanliness of the energy used determines the nature of carbon reduction. Under the guidance of the "double carbon" strategy, the coordinated development of new power systems with new energy as the main body and new energy vehicles has become inevitable. In the future, we must make up our minds to realize that electric vehicles mainly use clean electricity and achieve zero emissions from automobiles.
Taking electrification as the starting point, vigorously develop intelligence. In the future, the competition of the new energy vehicle track will focus on intelligent networking, and more than 80% of the changes in the next generation of vehicles will come from electrical and electronic architecture, chips and software. In the future, the focus of industrial competition and the highlight of enterprise success will be "electrification + intelligence", intelligence and electric will be deeply integrated, and cross-border innovation will be more active.
Solving the shortcomings of the supply chain will become the focus of development. In the process of the development of new energy vehicles, China has basically built an independent and controllable supply chain system, but some core materials, chips, equipment, etc. are still subject to people, such as cobalt and nickel resources imports of 97% and 92%, vehicle chip autonomy rate of less than 10%, by natural disasters, infrastructure obstacles or geopolitical frictions caused by the risk of supply interruption still exists. For automobile enterprises, the supply chain has become a strategic factor that determines the survival of enterprises; for the country, only by seizing the opportunity to accelerate the layout and accelerate the establishment of a strong intelligent supply chain for automobile electrification can we truly realize an automobile power.
China will become the world's most competitive new energy vehicle market. China with its world's largest automobile incremental market and new energy vehicle market will become a must for all auto companies, multinational auto companies will increase product launch, the next 5-10 years China's new energy vehicle market will usher in an industry reshuffle, some products and brands will be eliminated, the market clearance speed will be significantly accelerated, while some independent brands will further develop into global electric vehicle brands.
Source: People's Daily News
Author: Zhang Yongwei, Secretary General of China Electric Vehicle 100 Association and Researcher of Think Tank Center of Tsinghua University
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