Geely and GAC are accelerating their layout, and electric vehicles are getting cheaper and cheaper
Source of this article: Times Weekly Author: Li Zhuoling
With the continuous entry of OEMs, the power battery rivers and lakes are becoming more and more volatile.
A few days ago, ZEEKR Intelligent Technology officially released its first mass-produced 800V lithium iron phosphate ultra-fast charging battery - Golden Brick Battery. Officially, the volume utilization rate of BRICS batteries reached 83.7%, which will lead the 800V era in terms of safety, experience and cost. The Times Weekly reporter learned from ZEEKR that the BRICS battery has been officially mass-produced and rolled off the assembly line, and will be equipped on ZEEKR 007 for the first time.
A few days ago, GAC Aion announced that its full-stack self-developed and self-produced P58 microcrystalline super energy battery rolled off the production line, which adopts GAC's own lithium iron phosphate technology, which has advantages in battery life and energy density of the whole package. Further back, with the blessing of blade batteries, which are also lithium iron phosphate batteries, BYD's power battery installed capacity exploded. In addition, CATL's Shenxing super-rechargeable battery, which was first launched in China in August this year and just won an international award a few days ago, broke through the material ceiling and achieved 4C supercharging on lithium iron phosphate, so that ultra-fast charging is no longer exclusive to high-end models.
ZEEKR 007 Image source: Photo by Times Weekly
Under the big bets of downstream car companies and battery factories, the market share of lithium iron phosphate batteries is rising.
According to data from the China Automotive Power Battery Industry Innovation Alliance, in November this year, the installed capacity of power batteries in mainland China was 44.9GWh, with ternary batteries accounting for 35.0% of the total installed volume and lithium iron phosphate batteries accounting for 64.9%. In other words, the current market pattern of ternary lithium batteries and lithium iron phosphate batteries is close to the ratio of 7:3.
"The cost advantage of lithium iron phosphate batteries is still obvious. For enterprises to accelerate the layout of lithium iron phosphate battery track, on December 18, Qiu Kaijun, founder of electric vehicle observer, told the Times Weekly reporter that in terms of improving volume utilization, the current mainstream practice in the industry is to use CTP or CTC technology, in addition to cell structure innovation, welding process innovation and other practices.
Some industry insiders told reporters that through technological innovation, the price of batteries may be the best solution to the price war of electric vehicles. However, in Qiu Kaijun's view, ternary lithium will not be replaced by lithium iron phosphate batteries, and the former still has advantages in the high-end model market.
Volume technology, the problem is constantly overcome
Previously, the development of lithium iron phosphate batteries had fallen behind in the competition with ternary lithium batteries due to shortcomings such as relatively low energy density, weak low temperature resistance, and slow charging speed.
According to public information, as the two most mainstream technical routes in the field of power batteries, ternary lithium batteries and lithium iron phosphate batteries both use graphene as the anode material, but the cathode materials used are different: ternary lithium batteries mainly use nickel-cobalt-aluminum or nickel-cobalt-manganese as the cathode, and lithium iron phosphate batteries use lithium iron phosphate as the cathode.
Judging from the lithium iron phosphate batteries that have been released so far, in response to the above-mentioned problems, various manufacturers have shown their own magic but most of them have the same goal, including in terms of volume, space utilization, and overcharging technology.
Specifically, in terms of energy density, which is closely related to the range of electric vehicles, the traditional lithium iron phosphate batteries are difficult to compete with ternary lithium batteries. In order to overcome this problem, most companies choose to innovate in terms of structure and other aspects.
Qiu Kaijun pointed out to the Times reporter that the current mainstream approach is to use CTP or CTC technology, that is, to remove the module link, and directly form a battery pack from the battery cells, or even directly integrate with the body. In this way, a lot of structural parts, support parts, especially the hardware of the module link can be omitted. The second is the innovation of cell structure, or the innovation of welding process, such as integrated welding.
Image source: Photo by Time Weekly
Taking ZEEKR gold brick battery as an example, in order to place more cells in the battery pack, the ZEEKR engineering team has transformed the structure of the battery pack: an integrated liquid-cooled tray is used at the bottom of the battery to replace the traditional water pipe structure to reduce the squeeze of the cell space by structural parts, a "compact sandwich structure" of the cell, upper cover and bottom plate is used to release the longitudinal space of the cell compartment, and aviation-grade ultra-thin thermal barrier materials are used between the cells to fully improve the volume utilization rate.
Officially, compared with the traditional design, the total length of the sampling line of the BRICS battery has been shortened by 157 m, the number of core components has been reduced by 35%, and the energy density of the battery quality has also been increased by more than 10%.
In terms of CATL's Shenxing super-rechargeable battery, with the help of CTP3.0 technology's high integration and high group efficiency, it continues to break through the endurance performance of lithium iron phosphate. It is reported that the Shenxing super rechargeable battery can achieve a long endurance of more than 700 kilometers, and the acceleration of zero hundred does not decay in the state of low temperature power loss.
BYD's blade battery released in 2020 also uses structural innovation to skip the "module" when grouping, improving volume utilization, and finally achieving the design goal of installing more battery cells in the same space. At that time, the official said that compared with the traditional modular battery pack, the volume utilization rate of the "blade battery" has increased by more than 50%, and the mileage has reached the same level as the high-energy ternary lithium battery.
At the same time, many companies have also achieved fast charging capacity on lithium iron phosphate batteries through technological innovation. According to the combing, Aion's P58 microcrystalline super battery has 3C fast charging capability, which can be charged in 10 minutes and has a range of 250km. ZEEKR's self-developed global 800V architecture is matched with 800V extreme charging technology, so that the maximum charging power of the BRICS battery can reach 500 kW, the maximum charging rate reaches 4.5C, and the range can be increased by more than 500 km in 15 minutes within the fast charging range of 10%~80%.
Extreme Krypton Pole Charging Pile Image source: Photo by Times Weekly
In addition, poor low-temperature performance is one of the natural defects of lithium iron phosphate materials. In order to overcome the difficulties of low-temperature fast charging, CATL optimized the system platform and introduced battery cell temperature control technology to improve the low-temperature charging efficiency of Shenxing super-rechargeable batteries. According to official information, the Shenxing super rechargeable battery can be charged to 80% SOC in 10 minutes in addition to room temperature, and can be charged to 80% in 30 minutes even in a low temperature environment of -10°C.
ZEEKR also works thermal management capabilities, officials say that with this ability, the gold brick battery can minimize the impact of low-temperature ultra-fast charging, even in a low temperature environment of minus 10 °C, the gold brick battery can still achieve excellent charging speed, and its charging speed is at least a quarter higher than that of similar products.
Volume cost performance, electric cars will be cheaper and cheaper?
"Blade batteries will change the industry's dependence on ternary batteries, return the technical route of power batteries to the right path, and redefine the safety standards of new energy vehicles. At the time of the release of the blade battery, Wang Chuanfu, chairman of BYD, once asserted.
Judging from the market data, driven by the large bets of downstream car companies and battery factories, as well as the large-scale application of hot-selling models, lithium iron phosphate batteries, which are more cost-effective than ternary lithium batteries, have risen in market share in the past two years, and the loading volume in the Chinese market has crushed ternary lithium batteries.
It is reported that in May 2021, after the monthly output of lithium iron phosphate exceeded ternary lithium batteries for the first time in nearly three years, in July of the same year, its monthly loading volume also counterattacked ternary lithium batteries. Subsequently, the gap between the market share of the two has been widening.
According to the latest data from the China Automotive Power Battery Industry Innovation Alliance, in November this year, the installed capacity of power batteries in mainland China was 44.9GWh. Among them, the loading capacity of ternary batteries was 15.7GWh, accounting for 35.0% of the total installed volume, and the installed capacity of lithium iron phosphate batteries was 29.1GWh, accounting for 64.9% of the total installed volume.
Image source: China Automotive Power Battery Industry Innovation Alliance
Judging from the overall performance of this year, the cumulative loading volume of lithium iron phosphate batteries has also accounted for nearly 7 percent. From January to November this year, the cumulative installed capacity of power batteries in mainland China was 339.7GWh. Among them, the cumulative installed capacity of ternary lithium batteries was 109.6GWh, accounting for 32.3% of the total installed volume, and the cumulative installed volume of lithium iron phosphate batteries was 229.8GWh, accounting for 67.6% of the total installed volume.
Some industry insiders told the Times Weekly reporter that car companies bet on lithium iron phosphate batteries, which has an impact on the price of the entire electric vehicle. Through technological innovation, the price of batteries may be the best solution to the price war of electric vehicles.
According to the data released by the battery China's official micro on December 12, in the last batch of declared models this year, the declared models of new energy passenger vehicles reached 79, in terms of new car battery types, there are 39 lithium iron phosphate, 31 ternary batteries, 1 ternary battery + lithium manganese iron phosphate, in addition, there are 8 battery replacement models.
At present, some joint venture car companies have also begun to replace lithium iron phosphate batteries. According to the aforementioned data of Battery China, two models of SAIC-GM's Buick brand and one model of Chevrolet have declared lithium iron phosphate versions, and their battery supporting products are provided by BYD's Fodi battery subsidiary. In addition, Yueda Kia's two Kia EV5 models have also declared lithium iron phosphate versions.
On whether to start replacing lithium iron phosphate batteries, Times Weekly reporters interviewed Kia and SAIC-GM respectively, and Kia responded on December 19, "Yes, domestic batteries were purchased." SAIC-GM responded that it is true that there is lithium iron phosphate (model), and the supporting aspects are not clear. For the external supply of blade batteries, the Times Weekly reporter also interviewed BYD, but did not receive a response as of press time.
At present, the cost advantage of lithium iron phosphate batteries is still showing. The reporter learned from ZEEKR that through the optimization of cell composition, battery pack structure optimization, and intelligent production line, the production efficiency of BRICS batteries has been increased by more than 40%, and the comprehensive cost per kilowatt-hour of electricity can be reduced by 14.8% compared with ternary lithium batteries with the same performance.
At the same time, the realization of fast charging on lithium iron phosphate batteries has also promoted the sinking of technology and helped accelerate the popularization of electric vehicles. According to the Shanghai Securities Research Report, in the past, 4C fast-charging batteries were mainly ternary lithium batteries, with high prices and high-end models, and price factors restricted their promotion and application. According to the research report, the technology sinking is conducive to the application and promotion of fast charging batteries, and the penetration rate is expected to increase rapidly.
However, in terms of market trends, in the eyes of the industry, the future ternary lithium and lithium iron phosphate batteries will still develop in parallel. "Ternary lithium will not be replaced by lithium iron phosphate batteries, in the high-end model market, ternary (battery) still has advantages, it has high energy density, fast charging can be faster in the same situation, and low temperature attenuation is also a little better. Qiu Kaijun told a reporter from Time Weekly.