Author | Gokuneng
Edited by | Liu Yang
At the online press conference on January 18, Zeng Yuqun, the founder of CATL, stood for the power exchange business. In the video, he rolls down the window, pulls out a piece of chocolate, and says "Come on."
"Chocolate power exchange block" is the core of the power exchange business of the Ningde era. Chen Weifeng, general manager of times electric service, a subsidiary of Ningde Times, who presided over the business, said that a single replacement block can provide an endurance of 200 kilometers, and three blocks can have an endurance of 600 kilometers.
This is not the same as the single-pack power exchange mode of Weilai Automobile.
"We will spend two or three years building the world's largest battery exchange service network." Although the press conference was only 10 minutes long, the information revealed was significant. The era of electric service will be more free endurance choices, more standardized products, into the electric vehicle energy industry, will undoubtedly promote the standardization of the industry, will also accelerate the consumer exchange for new energy vehicles.
So, what kind of competitive pattern will the Cataline era bring to the main engine factory, upstream and downstream industrial chains, partners and other power exchange platforms?
1. Power exchange market:
Consumers are being impressed by prices and the speed of replenishment
Zhang Yuan, who initially planned to buy a charging model, decided to choose to change the electric model this year.
Zhang Yuan told Leopard Change that he saw that the subsidy would end at the end of 2022 years ago, so he planned to buy an electric car. After consulting the information and consulting the car company friends, he felt that it was more cost-effective to change the electric model.
Power exchange, as the name suggests, refers to the car company in the design of the model to leave a replaceable battery space, so that the owner can buy the car on the road, according to the needs of the battery replacement or upgrade battery.
The advantage of this type of vehicle and electricity separation is the reason for impressing Zhang Yuan to buy a replacement model.
Zhang Yuan, who commutes for a short time in the urban area, if he chooses the chocolate replacement battery of the Ningde era, a battery with a range of 200 kilometers is more than enough.
"If you need to go out of town, it is enough to replace 3 batteries at the substation on the highway and have an endurance of 600 kilometers." Zhang Yuan said after learning about the chocolate battery of the Ningde era.
Because the whole vehicle is divided into body and battery, the sale price of the replacement model can be 30% to 40% cheaper, and the battery rental.
"Anyway, the battery is like oil, it is not mine, as long as I can get on the road, I don't have to worry about battery maintenance." Zhang Yuan said.
An important reason for Zhang Yuan's decision to buy a power exchange model is that the speed of power exchange has been fast enough to even exceed refueling.
At present, the power exchange time on the market can be controlled within 5 minutes, and the maximum is not more than 10 minutes. The replacement time of the substation launched by CATL this time takes less than 3 minutes for the whole process, and it takes only 1 minute to replace a battery. The owner's power exchange experience is faster than refueling fuel vehicles.
What ensures that the owner can quickly change the power is the battery stock of the replacement power station.
Since the development of the first generation of replacement power stations, the battery stock has increased from the original 5 battery packs to the current 20 or even 30 pieces, and the stock of the replacement power station launched by the Ningde era has reached 48 pieces.
Taking passenger cars as an example, according to the current calculation of mostly replacing a battery pack, the replacement power station stores 5 batteries, the design service capacity is 72 times a day, and the actual operation can reach up to 120 times.
The replacement power station in the Ningde era has 48 batteries, and it can be selected to change the power supply in combination, which does not require manual care, and the time to change a battery is about 1 to 1.5 minutes. It is conservatively estimated that the replacement station can change 40 batteries in an hour, and theoretically 960 batteries can be changed in a day. If only one battery is exchanged for one car, 960 vehicles can be served; if one car exchanges two batteries, it can serve 480 vehicles.
According to the engineers of the Ningde era, 72 minutes can basically fully charge the replaced battery.
In addition to the efficiency of replenishment, the operator of the substation is much more professional than the general car in battery management and maintenance.
Taking the Ningde era as an example, they have a professional battery management team, "let professional people do professional things", eliminating the time and energy cost of car owners in battery maintenance.
The substation covers a small area, the general substation area is 3 to 5 parking spaces, can serve 300 private cars per day, and the utilization rate of land and distribution resources is amazing.
Power experts pointed out that the power exchange will decompose the charging time, the impact on the power grid is small, and basically will not increase the additional cost of maintaining the stability of the power grid.
It has been 15 years since the power exchange was proposed, and the support attitude of the policy has been clear.
In 2020, substations and charging facilities will be listed side by side in the government work report. In July of the same year, the power of the car in the power exchange mode was loosened, and the price cap of the subsidy for the power change model was abolished. In October last year, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology organized a pilot power exchange model to encourage enterprises to set up battery asset management companies.
2. Ningde era power exchange:
Let every battery be shared
The essence of power exchange is a business model, so that each power battery can be efficiently shared and utilized is the purpose.
At present, a rechargeable private electric vehicle, a battery pack can not be replaced, can only serve a car within 24 hours a day. The daily use time is about 4 hours, except for 4 hours of charging time, and the remaining 16 hours are idle.
If it enters the power exchange state, a battery pack through the operation of the battery bank, theoretically can increase the utilization time by at least 4 to 8 hours, and the utilization rate can be doubled.
According to the latest data released by the Traffic Management Bureau of the Ministry of Public Security, by the end of 2021, there will be 6.4 million pure electric vehicles in the country.
According to the "China Electric Vehicle Replacement Industry Market Prospect and Investment Strategic Planning Analysis Report", as of mid-May 2021, the number of battery replacement vehicles connected to the national platform was 155,900, of which about 78,800 were private passenger cars.
The total number of vehicles is 6.4 million, excluding 155,900 interchangeable vehicles and 50,000 interchangeable vehicles that increased in the second half of the year, and the number of vehicles that cannot be replaced is 6.1941 million.
After entering the power exchange mode, according to the battery pack contained in each non-replaceable vehicle, the utilization time can be increased by 4 hours per day, which means that the electric vehicle battery currently maintained in the market can allow twice the number of electric vehicles to travel on the road. Equal to all battery manufacturers, the annual production capacity has doubled.
Chen Weifeng, general manager of Times Electric Service, a wholly-owned subsidiary of CATL, is also repeatedly calculating this account.
"We are also reflecting, is the battery only a large power and customization of this technical direction?" On January 18, Chen Weifeng, general manager of Times Electric Services, pointed out at the online live broadcast conference that the separation of battery assets and the separation of vehicles and electricity means that users can rent batteries without buying batteries, which means that more users can share batteries, which means that each battery can be shared.
The one-electric multi-vehicle and combined power exchange launched by Times Electric Service this time is also based on the underlying logic of battery sharing and utilization.
Times Electric Service refined customer needs this time, and after "one change three", the utilization rate of the original 1 battery increased again.
Most electric vehicles are currently just a means to solve urban commuting. Therefore, before the electric vehicle of the car into one electric car, the whole battery served a car.
It is estimated that a multi-vehicle and a combination of power exchanges have increased the utilization rate of at least one battery by a third or even higher. This means that in the case of the same capacity, the vehicle data of the battery service can be improved by at least one-third.
Based on the current 6.1 million non-replacement models, the number of existing battery service vehicles can be increased by at least 2.03 million. According to the calculation of the installed capacity of the Ningde era that occupies half of the country, after entering the power exchange mode, only the batteries that have been shipped in the Ningde era are roughly estimated to increase the service vehicles on the existing basis by at least 1 million.
The chocolate battery pack of the Ningde era has improved the utilization rate of resources, reduced the total demand for batteries, the total demand for resources is also decreasing, and the dependence on the soaring lithium mine in the upstream will also decline synchronously.
According to a previous report by the China Business Times, it is expected that the total sales volume of the replacement model will exceed 3 million by 2025.
According to the calculation of doubling the battery utilization rate of the replacement model, these 3 million replacement models only need the battery packs of the existing 1.5 million non-replacement models to provide replenishment services.
"We hope to stand at the level of overall social resources, plan future possibilities, optimize funds, release time, share resources, and constantly explore better solutions to the efficiency of battery asset use." Chen Weifeng said.
3. Ningde era into the game to change the power:
"With a weathervane significance"
The power exchange market has entered the outlet and has attracted much market attention.
CICC's research report predicts that the number of new energy vehicles in 2021 will be 8.26 million, and the vehicle-to-pile ratio will be as high as 3.17, which is still accelerating. In 2022, there will be 10 million new energy vehicle owners, who have to rely on the public charging system to replenish energy, and the contradiction is prominent, and it is expected that there will be a "power exchange explosion" scene in 2022.
This contradiction was already evident during last year's National Day holiday. At that time, the owners of tourist attractions "charged for one hour and queued for 4 hours", and the owners had mileage and charging and replacing anxieties.
On the other hand, the upstream materials of power batteries suffered a sharp rise last year.
Shanghai Nonferrous Metals Network (SMM) data show that in 2021, the domestic battery-grade lithium carbonate price rose from 62,000 yuan / ton at the beginning of the year to 300,000 yuan / ton, lithium hydroxide price rose from 60,000 yuan / ton to 230,000 yuan / ton, cobalt sulfate price rose from 64,000 yuan / ton to 100,000 yuan / ton, manganese sulfate price rose from 6,400 yuan / ton to 10,000 yuan / ton, lithium hexafluorophosphate price rose from 85,000 yuan / ton to 550,000 yuan / ton.
At a time when downstream demand is strong and upstream material prices are soaring, power exchange is a good option.
At present, there are 6 types of market entities that enter the power exchange, namely equipment manufacturers, battery manufacturers, independent power exchange operators, host manufacturers, Sinopec PetroChina and the State Grid.
The explanatory text of the national standard "Construction Specification for Electric Passenger Vehicle Sharing and Replacement Power Station" released last year pointed out that the promotion and popularization of power exchange is inseparable from the growth of participating enterprises.
"The Ningde era entered the bureau to change electricity, at least the enterprise group has grown, which has the significance of the weather vane." An unnamed auto engineer characterized it this way: It's a directional choice.
4. Non-zero-sum games:
No company can fight alone in the power exchange
CICC research reports that in 2025, the scale of supporting substations will exceed 28,000, corresponding to a market size of 76.5 billion; batteries will be about 55GWh, corresponding to a market size of 38.8 billion; and corresponding to electricity revenue of 216.8 billion.
"It's a huge market where different types of businesses find their profit areas and profit points." An executive of a power exchange company told Leopard Change that the investment in power exchange is huge, and the cost of a replacement power station of Weilai Automobile is about 2 million yuan. According to the demand of 28,000 substations, this is often a hundred billion level of investment. Therefore, no company can fight alone in the power exchange market.
"If every company builds its own standard substation network, which stores 30 models of battery packs. This is a huge waste, and in fact it is impossible to appear. The executive of the above-mentioned power exchange company said.
Chen Weifeng also believes that after the unified standard of chocolate batteries, the repeated inventory of non-standard products in the substation is avoided. Battery standardization is conducive to saving resources and promoting the popularity of electric vehicles, which is an industry trend. However, the promotion of the power exchange market requires the joint efforts of all parties.
"There's technology and market first, and then there's standard." Chen Weifeng believes that standards will definitely lag behind the market and technology, but driven by innovation.
Times Electric Service launched a chocolate battery this time, and FAW Besturn jointly launched a power exchange model, "Many car companies are interested." Chen Weifeng said that there will be strategic cooperation releases in the future.
"We want to set up a battery bank, all battery maintenance and management is all responsible for the battery bank, the battery has nothing to do with the owner, and it has nothing to do with the car company." Chen Weifeng explained that after the rights and responsibilities of the power exchange are clear, there will be no ridicule due to the unclear division of rights and responsibilities.
According to the above calculations, if the power exchange market has a scale effect, in theory, the market demand for batteries is digested by the power exchange energy.
Compared with non-replacement models, power-changing models can reduce the amount of battery load and power consumption, and improve the energy efficiency of the whole vehicle; after the separation of vehicle electricity, the external price has a greater advantage over non-exchanged and fuel models, which is conducive to the popularization of electrification transformation. In addition, the cost of sales and battery maintenance of car companies will also decline, and the utilization rate of funds will increase.
"If chocolate batteries meet market demand and can solve consumer mileage and energy replenishment anxieties, more and more people will choose." Industry insiders pointed out that "after the increase in the number of people who choose to change the power model, after the car company finds that cooperation is beneficial to them, it will take the initiative to join the ranks of the power exchange, because the biggest demand of the car company is to sell more cars." ”
The industry insider pointed out that the promotion and popularization of the power exchange model must go through the test of the market, and the choice of future consumers is the most important. In order to save the expensive cost of self-built replacement power stations, while increasing vehicle sales, car companies will choose to cooperate with the Ningde era.
He pointed out that the competition pattern and cooperation model are determined by the market, but also affected by the relationship between supply and demand, for the consumption of electric vehicles, who can provide convenient, convenient and cheap services, who can win customers, win the market, Ningde era of entry, so that the market has a choice.
"Virtue is not alone, but there will be neighbors... CATL itself is our partner in establishing a battery asset company in 2020, and now personally changing the power supply will further promote the development of power exchange. ”
On January 18, Shen Fei, senior vice president of WEILAI Automobile, wrote in the WeChat circle of friends.