1. Favorable Factors
(1) During the "Eleventh Five-Year Plan" period, the central government will invest 60 million yuan in the research and development of lithium-ion batteries, and at the same time require the companies undertaking the projects to invest matching funds at a ratio of 10, so the total investment will reach 600 million yuan. However, during the "Fifth Five-Year Plan" period, the national funding for lithium battery research and development was only 8 million yuan, and with the local matching funds, it was only about 16 million yuan.
(2) The "Management Measures for Pollution Control of Electronic Information Products" issued by seven ministries including the Ministry of Information Industry will regulate the recycling of waste electrical appliances, including batteries. Meanwhile, the National Development and Reform Commission and other departments will issue the "Management Measures for the Recycling of Waste Household Appliances" to standardize the recycling process. Since toxic and harmful substances such as lead, mercury, and cadmium are widely used in the battery industry, the development of the battery sector will be greatly affected. This is beneficial to the development of the lithium-ion battery industry.
(3) On September 14, 2006, five ministries, including the Ministry of Finance, jointly issued the "Notice on Adjusting Export Tax Rebate Rates for Some Commodities and Supplementing the Catalogue of Prohibited Commodities for Processing Trade." According to the Notice, the export tax rebate policy for lead-acid batteries and mercury oxide batteries was abolished; however, as early as 2004, the export tax rebate rate for batteries had begun to decline year by year and would be gradually and completely abolished. Currently, lead-acid batteries, mercury oxide batteries, and nickel-cadmium batteries have been included in the catalogue of prohibited commodities for processing trade, and import duties and import-related taxes are levied on all goods included in this catalogue, with the rate increased from 13% to 17%.
(4) According to a report published by market research firm IIT in March 2007, in addition to traditional main applications such as laptops and mobile phones, new applications such as power tools, other consumer electronics, light electric vehicles and electric vehicles have injected high growth momentum into lithium-ion batteries and will become the main driving force for the total output value of lithium-ion batteries to reach US$10 billion in 2016.
(5) The development of power lithium batteries in various countries has made great progress. The cathode materials are mainly lithium iron phosphate and lithium manganese oxide. In terms of capacity, safety, cycle life and other aspects, they can fully meet the requirements of power equipment. They have begun to be used in electric bicycles, hybrid electric vehicles, pure electric vehicles, electric boats, UPS power supplies and other energy storage devices. They will be used in large quantities in the next few years.
2. Negative Factors
(1) The current bottlenecks in the development of lithium-ion batteries are their safety performance and the management system of automotive power batteries. In terms of safety performance, due to the high energy density, high operating temperature, and harsh working environment of lithium-ion power batteries, coupled with the human-centered safety concept, users have put forward very high requirements for battery safety. In terms of the management system of automotive power batteries, since the operating voltage of automotive power batteries is 12V or 24V, while the operating voltage of a single power lithium-ion battery is 3.7V, multiple batteries must be connected in series to increase the voltage. However, since it is difficult for batteries to achieve completely uniform charging and discharging, the individual batteries in the series-connected battery pack will experience charging and discharging imbalances. The batteries will experience undercharging and over-discharging phenomena, which will lead to a sharp deterioration in battery performance, ultimately causing the entire battery pack to malfunction or even become unusable, thus greatly affecting the battery's service life and reliability.
(2) At present, the separators used in lithium batteries are basically imported. If domestic production is achieved, the manufacturing cost can be greatly reduced. Currently, only a few domestic companies have made breakthroughs in separator manufacturing technology and started mass production, but they cannot completely replace imported separators.
(3) Expanding the scale of lithium battery production, improving automation, and reducing costs require substantial financial investment. Additionally, significant upfront investment in supporting charging infrastructure is needed to create a favorable environment for electric vehicle applications. Currently, China lags behind in supporting infrastructure, which hinders the use of lithium battery-powered vehicles in the country.
Major global power battery suppliers
Country
Technology School Company
Downstream customers Japan
Sanyo Electric
Nickel-metal hydride batteries, lithium-ion batteries, Volkswagen, Ford
Japan
Nickel-metal hydride batteries, lithium-ion batteries (Toyota, Honda)
Panasonic Electric Vehicle Energy Company
Struggle
Hitachi Japan
Nickel-metal hydride batteries, lithium-ion batteries Eaton
Japan
INNEX
Ni-MH batteries, lithium-ion batteries Honda
Japan
NECLamilion Energy Nickel-Metal Hydride Batteries, Lithium-Ion Batteries
Japan
Litel
Nickel-metal hydride batteries and lithium-ion batteries; Mitsubishi Motors' Japanese-German joint venture, Degussa Enax, produces nickel-metal hydride batteries and lithium-ion batteries.
Guan Guo
Eaton Corporation
Nickel-metal hydride batteries, lithium-ion batteries, Kenworth Trucks, etc.
USA
Simplified Power Company
Nickel-chlorine batteries, lithium-ion batteries, General Motors, Chrysler
USA
Johnson Controls
Nickel-metal hydride batteries, lithium-ion batteries, General Motors, Chrysler
US-France joint venture JCS
Nickel-metal hydride batteries, lithium-ion batteries Ford
Germany
Continental Group
Nickel-metal hydride batteries, lithium-ion batteries, Wimler
France
SAFT
Nickel-metal hydride batteries, lithium-ion batteries, Peugeot Citroën, Renault
LG Chem (4 countries)
Nickel-metal hydride batteries and lithium-ion batteries are universal
BYD China
BYD
Lithium iron phosphate battery
