Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

"now the second-hand batteries of old electric vehicles are almost all second-hand."

With the surge in the number of new energy vehicles in China, the problem of power battery recycling is becoming more and more urgent. New energy vehicles, which have been seven or eight years old, are now facing upgrading, and a large number of decommissioned power batteries used to be a problem in the industry.

In recent years, the recycling and echelon utilization of decommissioned power batteries have been discussed in the industry. However, due to the technical standards of echelon utilization, the difficulty of estimating the residual value of decommissioned cells, and the impact of raw material price fluctuations on recycling economy, the development of power battery recycling industry is difficult.

Among them, the public opinion is most concerned about who is in charge of power battery recycling. Where should the recycled retired power batteries go?

"01" is all caused by camping fever and RV fever? According to industry insiders, there seems to be a new answer to similar questions in 2022: power battery recycling is on the eve of the market explosion.

According to the report released by EVTank, the domestic lithium battery recycling market will reach 48.29 billion yuan in 2022 and will approach 100 billion yuan in 2026. According to China Energy News, the domestic lithium battery recycling market is only 17 billion in 2021.

More power battery recycling agencies revealed that this year, some retired mainstream brand power batteries, there has been a "one core is difficult to obtain" phenomenon, the price of second-hand power batteries, is also soaring.

"this year, the company's shipments of second-hand power batteries are expected to double that of last year."

He Chong (pseudonym) is the head of a power battery recycling company in Dongguan. He said that although his company is small, it is also one of the early companies involved in the power battery recycling business, which can be regarded as witnessing the development of this "small gold mine".

At present, thanks to the backup power supply of domestic communication towers and base stations in recent years, a large number of power batteries decommissioned, recycled and cascaded have also flowed to the communications industry.

However, the huge echelon battery demand of communication towers and base stations is usually undertaken by large organizations in the industry. As a small and medium-sized power battery recycling enterprise in the region, he Chong said frankly that the main target customers are still enterprises with photovoltaic and energy storage needs.

"the market for enterprise energy storage is small, so salespeople used to ask Party A to buy second-hand batteries." But this year, the wind in the industry seems to have changed. Instead of racking their brains to improve performance, there are companies coming to buy second-hand batteries.

Such as Ningde era, BYD, Guoxuan, Singapore Airlines and other first-and second-tier brands of retired power batteries, as soon as they are dismantled, the whole batch of enterprises will be pulled away. Some enterprises even take the initiative to "contract" the amount of battery disassembly for half a year, "as long as it is a specific brand of battery, how many, how much."

With the increasing demand for second-hand power batteries, he Chong also found that the supply of upstream decommissioned new energy vehicles and battery packs began to become tight, and a large number of companies flocked to the power battery recycling track in an attempt to get a piece of the pie.

According to the relevant data: in 2021, the number of domestic power battery recycling related enterprises increased by 24400, a year-on-year increase of 635.17%. As of March 2022, there are 40600 power battery recycling related enterprises in China.

"with a surge in market demand, the price of recycled power batteries is starting to go up and is often out of stock." He Chong revealed that the current recycling price of power lithium batteries in the industry is about 400 yuan per kilowatt-hour, but in mid-2020, the recycling price is only 120-150 yuan per kilowatt-hour, which has more than doubled.

According to news learned by thepaper.cn from Shanghai Nonferrous Network: since the beginning of September this year, the domestic waste lithium battery recycling market has continued the tight supply since August, and the waste supply is less than the capacity demand of battery recycling enterprises.

Driven by the imbalance between supply and demand and the rising price of domestic lithium carbonate, the price of power battery recycling also continues to rise.

Obviously, the market competition for decommissioned power batteries has reached a white-hot level.

However, it is curious that the demand for the echelon utilization of power batteries in the communications industry has always been undertaken by large recycling institutions, and the energy storage needs of enterprises are lukewarm at present. So what on earth makes the supply of second-hand power batteries tight?

"I think it's the recent craze for saloon cars and camping that has pushed up the demand for second-hand power batteries." He Chong said that at present, the main customers who purchase second-hand power batteries and batteries from them are RV refitting factories and outdoor power manufacturers.

The door of the "02" power battery recycling industry is not available yet. Wait a few more days. I'll let you know as soon as I have the goods. "

For more than half a month, A Yi can receive dozens of phone calls from customers every day, asking if the second-hand power battery has arrived.

Ayitan Airway, which runs a medium-sized RV retrofit factory in Guangzhou, is still home to more than a dozen self-propelled RVs, which have stalled because of a shortage of second-hand power batteries.

This year, the major short video platforms appeared in the residential life, Beijing drifters RV tourism and other content, promote RV sales soar. According to data released by the China Automobile Circulation Association, RV sales rose 17% in the first quarter of this year compared with the same period last year, the highest in the same period in nearly five years.

The rise in domestic RV sales has also boosted the business of refit car factories to a certain extent. "now consumers are very shrewd. They buy the lowest configuration of RV, and after they get it, they spend money on modification and upgrading, which is achieved in one step. It can save a lot of money than the original factory."

Ah Yi explained that the main reason for the modification of RVs is to change water and electricity. Among them, many consumers have bought low-equipped RVs, and the battery capacity of the original factory is very limited, often with only two or three kilowatt-hours of electricity, so it is difficult to meet the daily life of living, so they expand their capacity at their own expense.

"in the past, lead-acid batteries were used to expand the capacity of batteries, which were cheap, but clunky and heavy, and the price was too expensive to use brand-new car-powered lithium electricity. now second-hand power batteries are the most cost-effective, with moderate energy density and weight."

He explained that if the RV is expanded by 10 kilowatt-hours of electricity, if it uses lead-acid batteries, it will increase its weight by at least 350 kilograms, slow charging speed and poor experience. If a brand new power battery is used, it weighs only 80 kilograms, but it costs at least 15000 yuan.

"in general, the power battery on a car needs to be replaced because the remaining 80% of its capacity does not meet the requirements, but it is just right for the RV to expand its capacity. taking into account the capacity loss, the expansion of 10 kilowatt-hour electricity is about 100kg, and the cost is only 4000 yuan."

A Yi frankly said that if it had been last year, the RV would have been expanded before the price of second-hand power batteries went up, the same 10 kilowatt-hour electricity would only cost 1500 yuan. In some short video platforms, there have been saloon cars modified UP main complain, the current shortage of second-hand power batteries, and the price is extremely high.

In addition to RV fever, camping fever has also contributed to the popularity of outdoor power supplies. According to JD.com 's official data, the turnover of outdoor power supply increased 57 times in the first 10 minutes of this year's 618 event compared with the same period last year.

"but the price of outdoor power is very high. Outdoor power with one kilowatt-hour of electricity costs about NT $3,000 to NT $4,000." The person in charge of a small outdoor power factory in Zhongshan said that the mainstream brand outdoor power supply integrates energy storage and inverter, but the high price makes many consumers choose large power supplies produced by small factories to be used with inverters.

After all, the factory uses second-hand power batteries to make a large power supply, once only 600 yuan; online sale of a 1000W pure Xuan wave inverter, the price is less than 700 yuan. Combined with the two, users only need 1300 yuan to achieve the effect of thousands of yuan of outdoor power of mainstream brands.

More and more savvy RV consumers and camping enthusiasts will naturally "vote with their hands" to choose the most affordable and echelon way of energy storage to meet the needs of living and camping. And the second-hand power batteries recycled from new energy vehicles naturally have a new place to go.

But how long can this popularity last?

With the in-depth understanding of the power battery recycling industry, it is not difficult to find that whether it is RV fever, camping heat, or enterprise energy storage field, power battery ladder utilization is gradually moving towards "partial science".

Some power battery recycling enterprises, RV refitting factories and outdoor power manufacturers all reflect that the supply of second-hand power batteries is tight at present, and many customers will consider old batteries other than the first and second echelon brands. But the only "user insistence" is to recognize only lithium iron phosphate batteries.

"after years of publicity, consumers now know that ternary lithium is easy to heat out of control." A Yi said: almost all consumers who expand the capacity of RVs require refitting factories to use second-hand, brand-name lithium iron phosphate batteries when changing batteries.

Cautious users may even ask the refitting plant to take apart some of the battery modules during the acceptance inspection, and only when they see the words "IFR" on the battery cell, that is, lithium iron phosphate, can they rest assured that it will be more appropriate to use lithium iron phosphate on the car. "

Similarly, some outdoor power manufacturers also said that although the energy density of ternary lithium batteries is relatively high and "Big portable battery" using ternary lithium batteries has advantages in weight and portability, there are still many customers who specify that lithium iron phosphate cells must be used.

As consumers pay more attention to the safety of outdoor power supply, the proportion of lithium iron phosphate battery used in the mainstream outdoor power products on e-commerce platform is gradually increasing. The change of consumer perception is gradually changing the market structure of second-hand battery trading.

As for other areas of energy storage, the industry's "discrimination" against the echelon use of ternary lithium batteries is even more serious.

In July this year, the National Energy Administration announced that it was proposed to stipulate that medium and large electrochemical energy storage power stations should not use ternary lithium batteries and should not use echelon batteries.

Even if the echelon power battery is selected, consistency screening should be carried out and safety assessment should be carried out combined with traceability data. Although the regulation is aimed at medium and large energy storage power stations, it undoubtedly points the way for other energy storage systems.

However, the question also comes: the current disassembly, recycling, echelon use of lithium iron phosphate batteries, can meet the needs of the industry?

He Chong pointed out in the exchange that most of the current decommissioned power batteries are removed from new energy vehicles that are seven or eight years old. "between 2015 and 2019, most mainstream new energy household vehicles were ternary lithium, and only commercial vehicles used lithium iron phosphate, and sales of new energy vehicles were not high at that time."

Therefore, the scale of the recycled power battery, ternary lithium is definitely larger than that of lithium iron phosphate.

Data show that in 2019, more than 80% of the battery materials on the market were ternary lithium, while lithium iron phosphate batteries accounted for less than 5%. Lithium iron phosphate batteries are loaded more than ternary lithium batteries, which is also a matter of this year.

[concluding remarks]

Thus it can be seen that most of the ternary lithium batteries dismantled will eventually skip the link of volume utilization, move towards regeneration and become the raw material of power batteries again.

At this stage, the echelon utilization of power batteries is doomed to encounter growth troubles like "partial undergraduates".

This article comes from the official account of Wechat: know Notes (ID:dongdong_note), author: know who you are.

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