The best-selling "magic car" with flying lithium ferric phosphate battery

If you want to choose a new energy "national magic car" in China, it must be Wuling Hongguang MINI. Hongguang MINI EV since its listing in July 2020, the explosive power, only half a year sales exceeded 150000 vehicles, beating Tesla to become the Chinese market sales NO.1. Ouyang Minggao, academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, spoke highly of it: "Wuling New Energy is a model of new energy in China."

Hongguang MINI is indeed a well-deserved "popular king of new energy in China". Since its inception, it has repeatedly created a sales "myth". The pre-sale order exceeded 1000 vehicles in less than 10 hours, exceeded 30, 000 vehicles before the official order went on sale, and sold more than 15000 vehicles only 20 days after the launch, setting a world record for sales of small new energy models exceeding 10, 000 vehicles.

It is worth noting that the hot sale of Hongguang MINI has also led to a substantial increase in the installed capacity of lithium iron phosphate batteries. Battery suppliers such as Ningde Times, Guoxuan Hi-Tech and Penghui Energy have all benefited from it. Recently, in order to celebrate the sales results, Wuling Automobile will launch Hongguang MINI EV commemorative model for the year of the Ox. In addition, Wuling Motors also launched an upgraded version of Hongguang MINI, the newly upgraded Hongguang MINI with lithium iron phosphate battery pack, and the mileage increased to 200km.

In addition to Hongguang MINI, another "small and beautiful" Great Wall Euler is also rapidly out of the circle in the industry because of strong sales. According to the official data of Euler, in December 2020, Euler strongly sold 12745 vehicles, a year-on-year increase of 380.4%. The cumulative sales in 2020 reached 56261, leaving behind the new car-building stars such as Lulai, Xiaopeng and ideal, and became a leading brand of new energy in China.

At the beginning of this year, Great Wall Euler officially announced that the Euler Black Cat Meng pet version is officially on the market. The subsidized price of the new car is 69800 yuan, which is also 301km long, but its battery pack has been changed from ternary lithium battery to lithium iron phosphate battery. The battery capacity has also been increased to 30.8 kilowatt hours.

In fact, the best-selling models favored by lithium iron phosphate batteries are far more than Hongguang MINI and Euler. At present, popular models such as BYD Han EV and Tesla (Shanghai) Model 3 are also equipped with lithium iron phosphate batteries. In addition, pure electric passenger cars such as BAIC EC/EU series, SAIC GM Wuling Baojun E series, Changan Auchan, Hezhong new energy Nafu series and other pure electric passenger cars have also launched models equipped with lithium iron phosphate batteries.

In terms of shipment data, lithium iron phosphate batteries have counterattacked in the past year after being suppressed by ternary batteries for many years. The cumulative sales of power batteries in China in 2020 were 65.9 GWH, down 12.9% from the same period last year. Of these, the cumulative sales of ternary lithium batteries were 34.8 GWH, down 34.4% from the same period last year, and the cumulative sales of lithium iron phosphate batteries were 30.8 GWH, up 49.2% from the same period last year.

Enhance market competitiveness

It is obvious that lithium iron phosphate batteries have ushered in a second spring. Industry analysts believe that the recovery of lithium iron phosphate mainly benefits from the decline of subsidies for new energy vehicles in China in 2020. "the subsidy retrograde plus the energy density requirements of the battery system remain unchanged, narrowing the gap in the acquisition of subsidies between lithium iron phosphate models and ternary models for passenger cars, and lithium iron phosphate batteries with relatively high performance and price become the best choice for manufacturers." A domestic industry insiders said.

At present, with the increasingly fierce competition in the new energy vehicle market, lithium iron phosphate has a cost advantage over ternary materials, prompting automobile companies to use more lithium iron phosphate batteries to reduce production costs. Citic Securities reported that Tesla (Shanghai) produced Model 3 standard battery life upgrade to replace the Ningde era lithium iron phosphate battery, assuming that according to the unit battery pack 0.10 yuan / Wh cost savings, each battery pack can reduce the cost by about 5000 yuan. At the same time, the report predicts that the current lithium iron phosphate battery version of Model 3 still has a gross margin of about 25%, with room for further price cuts.

Not only that, the energy density of lithium iron phosphate battery is also increasing. Ouyang Minggao, academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said that in recent years, through a series of improvements such as lithium supplement, silicon doping and the use of solid-liquid mixed electrolytes, the energy density of lithium iron phosphate batteries can break through 200Wh/Kg. The volume group efficiency of the battery unit to the system is increased from 40% to 60%, and the range can reach 600 km. In January this year, Guoxuan Hi-Tech unveiled its lithium iron phosphate battery with an energy density of 210Wh/kg, and its monomer energy density has reached the level of ternary NCM5 system.

Galaxy Securities believes that with the continuous maturity of research and development technology of power battery enterprises, the promotion and application of CTP technology and BYD blade battery technology in Ningde era can both reduce costs and improve the energy density of battery system, making lithium iron phosphate battery with the characteristics of high safety and low cost, and enhanced market competitiveness.

Manufacturers full-line production

While the installed capacity of lithium iron phosphate batteries has increased significantly, battery manufacturers are also full production. Penghui Energy said on the interactive platform a few days ago that the company's power battery continues to ship, the power battery production line has been full production, and sales continue to increase. All the new energy vehicle power batteries produced and sold by the company are lithium iron phosphate batteries.

"in fact, the Spring Festival this year can not be rest for a few days, and now the market demand is still relatively strong, and the orders are quite full." A staff member of Guoxuan Hi-Tech revealed to the media. According to industry insiders, there will be a big year of demand growth for lithium iron phosphate in 2021, which is expected to reach 80% year-on-year growth. Citic Construction Investment Securities predicts that the market share of lithium iron phosphate batteries in China will increase to 40% to 50% in the future, and is also expected to reach 1% in the world.

According to agency estimates, the demand for lithium iron phosphate cathode materials in 2020, 2021 and 2022 is expected to be 130000 tons, 240000 tons and 340000 tons respectively. Taking into account the future global demand for power batteries and energy storage batteries, it is estimated that the global demand for lithium iron phosphate cathode materials will be about 980000 tons in 2025, corresponding to a market size of about 28 billion yuan, with an average annual compound growth rate of 43 percent from 2020 to 2025.

Citic Securities pointed out that at present, mainstream overseas new energy vehicle companies such as Tesla and Daimler have clearly defined the path of lithium iron phosphate battery, and it is expected that other overseas car companies, such as BMW and Volkswagen, will also choose lithium iron phosphate in their electrification path, and lithium iron phosphate battery is expected to achieve global support. With the launch of more models equipped with lithium iron phosphate batteries, the demand for lithium iron phosphate will remain strong for a long time.

According to the SMM quotation, the spot price of lithium iron phosphate has been rising continuously since December 17. As of today, the average price of lithium iron phosphate (power type) is 42500 yuan / ton, up 22.3% from December 17.

"Click to view the spot historical price of cobalt lithium.