Not long ago, a piece of news aroused the attention of netizens.
Continental plans to invest about 6 billion yuan in the research and development of all-solid-state batteries. The investment is expected to provide basic R&D support from the government for six companies, including CATL, BYD, FAW, SAIC, Weilan New Energy and Geely.
Although many people paid attention to this news, but did not notice the meaning behind it, and some people felt that 6 billion for the research and development of solid-state batteries, is a drop in the bucket, in fact, the country invested in solid-state batteries, there are two points that can basically be determined.
The first point is that the state has set the tone, and solid-state batteries have been determined as the next generation of research and development direction of power batteries. Although the investment of 6 billion yuan is not much for the entire industrial chain, it is an important tone.
The second point is that solid-state battery technology must break through, and there must have been a certain technological breakthrough at present, and the country has seen the possibility of mass production of solid-state batteries, which is only one step away.
In the first half of this year, SAIC Motor held a press conference, known as the countdown of 500 days, SAIC "dead" solid-state battery, "the first all-solid-state battery production line was completed and the countdown of 500 days was officially launched." In other words, around 2026, SAIC's solid-state batteries will be mass-produced in 2026. The solid-state battery mass production enterprise of SAIC comes from Qingtao, which is strategically invested by SAIC.
Prior to this, the semi-solid-state battery developed by SAIC Qingtao has been on the car of Zhiji L6, achieving an energy density of more than 300Wh/kg and a cruising range of more than 1000 kilometers. The semi-solid-state battery, in fact, is not a solid-state battery, its electrolyte is not solid-state, and the solid-state battery is revolutionary compared with all batteries on the market, including the semi-solid-state battery.
So, how much better is the all-solid-state battery than the semi-solid-state battery? To put it simply, there are three points.
The first point, energy density, SAIC's semi-solid-state battery, the energy density is 300Wh/kg, and the solid-state battery can reach 400Wh/kg, and it can even be increased to 500Wh/kg in the follow-up, compared with the current liquid lithium-ion battery is a leap forward, which means that not only the future range of 1000 km models will abound, and most importantly, the increase in energy density means that new energy vehicles reduce weight, but also mean that energy consumption is reduced.
The second point is that the safety is better, although the current power battery also has a variety of acupuncture experiments, a variety of blister experiments, but the problem is that the level of each is uneven, and the packaging process has a lot to do with it, and it has not completely eliminated spontaneous combustion, and solid-state batteries, it can be said that there is no risk of thermal runaway.
The third point is that the low-temperature performance is better, which is very important, because consumers in the northern region give up new energy vehicles, many of which are because the power battery attenuates seriously at low temperatures, mainly because the liquid electrolyte becomes more viscous and the ionic conductivity decreases at low temperatures, while the solid-state battery has no liquid electrolyte at all, so there is no such problem.
For solid-state batteries, SAIC Qingtao implements a three-step strategy: the first step is a semi-solid-state battery, the proportion of liquid in the electrolyte is reduced to 10%, the second step is to reduce 5%, and the third step is to achieve complete solid-state production. The third step will be achieved in 2026, and the all-solid-state battery will be delivered in 2027.
Of course, in addition to SAIC, basically all the head battery companies and car companies on the market are developing solid-state batteries, so if you don't just need it, I suggest you wait a little longer, wait for the solid-state battery to get on the car, 2 years, so many years have been waiting, and it is not bad for these two years.