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

With regard to the understanding of new energy vehicles, both China and Japan live in their own information cocoon rooms, both feel that they are leading the world, and the other is heading for collapse.

For example, in China, "new energy vehicles are the future trend" has become a basic consensus, and Chinese new energy vehicles are leading the development of this trend, sweeping the market with lightning. Traditional oil vehicles, especially Japanese cars, are being completely replaced and eliminated.

This argument is supported by solid data. According to Canalys's data for the first half of 2023, global electric vehicle sales rose 49 per cent to 6.2 million in the first half of 2023, of which Chinese mainland market sales reached 3.4 million, accounting for 55 per cent of the market share. And China accounts for 12 of the top 20 best-selling new energy models in the world, while there are none of Japanese cars.

Back in the Chinese market, the contrast is even more obvious. China's automobile production and sales in the first half of 2023 reached 1324.8 million and 13.239 million respectively, up 9.3% and 9.8% respectively from the same period last year, a record high, including 3.75 million new energy vehicles, up 44% from the same period last year. However, in this environment, even Toyota, Honda and Nissan, which are known as the "top three Japanese cars", can hardly hide their decline. Nissan's first-half sales fell 22.4%, Honda fell 22%, and Toyota fell for the first time in the Chinese market, down 2.8%.

However, what Japan sees is a completely different picture: new energy vehicles are not necessarily the future, hybrid is a more realistic choice, while Japanese cars still have an absolute advantage in the hybrid market, far ahead in terms of sales and profits.

Japan's perspective is also supported by data, according to global car sales in 2023, the first 10 days of the world accounted for four cars (Toyota, Nissan, Honda, Suzuki). Among them, Toyota sold 5.41 million vehicles in the first half of the year, up 5.5% from 2022, ranking first in the world for four consecutive years. By contrast, China's BYD has just entered the top 10 and ranks behind Suzuki with sales of 1.25 million vehicles, posing little threat to Japanese cars. In addition, Toyota's second-quarter operating profit reached 1 trillion yen, an all-time high for Japanese companies.

It is worth mentioning that the hybrid models of Japanese cars are absolutely dominant, and the penetration of new energy vehicles is very low. For example, of Toyota's 5.41 million sales, 46171 new energy vehicles (pure electricity and plug-in) have been sold, accounting for less than 1 per cent.

In other words, China and Japan see very different information, judgments about future car trends and perceptions of the world. This difference in cognition leads China and Japan to different directions of development.

So when many people in China wonder why Japanese automakers, which have always been leading, suddenly fall behind and lag so far behind in the field of new energy vehicles. The answer given by Japan is surprisingly simple: Japan is not lagging behind, it is just moving in the other direction.

Japan's hybrid route: an advantage that grows from a disadvantage in fact, the rise of Japanese cars is a complete accident. In developing the automobile industry, Japan has a congenital disadvantage-lack of energy. Japan's energy self-sufficiency rate is very low, with a peak of less than 20%. It imports almost all the fuel needed for cars, 95% of which comes from the Middle East.

Under the constraints of this reality, fuel saving has become a rigid demand for Japanese cars, so Japanese self-developed cars are cheap and fuel-efficient at the beginning. But for a long time, the weak advantage brought by the fuel-saving characteristics of Japanese cars was not worth mentioning in front of EU cars and was ridiculed as toys in Europe and the United States.

However, in the face of the reality of energy shortage, Japan has no choice but to retreat to the domestic market and carry out the fuel-saving route to the end. When the time came in 1973, the oil crisis in the Middle East caused oil prices to soar tenfold in just a few years, and even the deep-pocketed American people had to tighten their belts. Japanese cars, which focus on fuel-efficient routes, suddenly became popular and boomed all over the world.

This experience perfectly fits the closed spirit of Japan: as long as you follow your own path to the extreme, the tuyere of the world will eventually turn around and follow in the footsteps of Japan. The same is true in the auto industry, where Japan is still sparing no effort in fuel-efficient routes when the world starts to change tracks to tram routes.

Toyota, for example, is not doing nothing, but striving for excellence in the hybrid system. Toyota's THS hybrid system is mainly driven by the engine, and then uses the motor to make up for the deficiency of the engine. When idling or stopping frequently in the urban area, the excess kinetic energy of the engine can be recovered, which can be used to charge and store the battery, and then the stored electricity will drive the vehicle to make up for the inefficiency of the engine, thus greatly reducing fuel consumption. For example, the comprehensive fuel consumption of the latest Carola twin-engine version is as low as 3.5L oil, which is comparable to the hottest plug-in new energy vehicles and added new energy vehicles in terms of comprehensive energy consumption.

If put in the context of Japanese energy, Toyota's hybrid system advantage is more obvious. For example, nearly 80% of Japan's electricity comes from fossil fuels (coal, oil, natural gas). Importing fossil fuels to generate electricity and then using electricity to drive cars, taking into account the energy loss in the middle, is certainly not as economical as using oil to drive cars directly.

In addition, Japan's prospects for new energy are limited. Japan has a small land area, and most of it is in mountainous areas. the development of hydropower, wind power and solar energy is not only high in cost, but also limited in scale. Nuclear power, which Japan once had high hopes for, was shut down after the Fukushima incident in 2012. Although Japan has begun to restart nuclear power in recent years, considering that Japan is an earthquake-prone area, if nuclear power is greatly developed, the Fukushima incident will happen again sooner or later.

In other words, in the context of nuclear power decommissioning, Japan's clean energy development space is very limited. Vigorously developing electric vehicles will lead to an increase in the production of thermal power in Japan, making it difficult to achieve the goal of carbon peak and carbon neutralization.

Many people say that Japan has clicked on the wrong science and technology tree and gone in the wrong direction, but in fact, it does not see the reality of Japan. Japan has not made a mistake. Japan goes to the end on the road of fuel saving and vigorously develops the hybrid system, which is actually the best choice for Japanese car companies that master the core technology of hybrid, or for the energy-poor Japanese society.

The real dilemma of Japanese cars is that the best choice for Japan is not the best choice for the world.

The fate of dependent variables: the world has other plans to develop Japanese fuel-efficient cars due to lack of resources, which can be said to be boundless with the blessing of the hybrid system of Toyota and other car companies. On the one hand, in terms of sales and profits, Japanese cars have entered the forefront of the world, nibbling away more than 70% of the market share of the world hybrid market; on the other hand, technically, Toyota has built patent barriers by using technologies such as THS, blocking car factories in Europe, the United States, China, and South Korea, and enjoying the "mixed" cake for a long time.

Japan's strategy is well thought out and done very well. the only problem is that Japan is only a dependent variable of the world and can only comply with the rules, while independent variables such as the European Union, the United States, and China, which can profoundly affect the world order, can change the rules or even redefine them.

First of all, the European Union has used the traditional arts to "win, compete freely, and lose, change the rules." The rise of Japanese cars has first eroded the market share of European and American car companies. As a result, under the political correctness of reducing carbon emissions, the European Union proposed diesel routes and criticized Japanese cars for being unenvironmentally friendly. The proportion of diesel vehicles in Europe reached 51.6% in 2015. But soon, the European Union was slapped in the face, the fraud of Volkswagen diesel data was exposed, and Europe's diesel route came to an end. Subsequently, the EU continued to change the rules to limit the carbon emissions of cars when they were running so low that, according to EU standards, only trams, jumpers and fuel cell cars could meet, while Japanese fuel mixes, no matter how economical, still have emissions.

Although Japan opposes the EU's method of calculation, it points out that the EU only calculates carbon emissions during the running period, not during the production and recycling stages. If you calculate the carbon emissions over the entire life cycle of the car, the Japanese fuel mix is as good as the tram. But Japan was unable to change the rules, and in December 2020, then Prime Minister Yoshihiro Suga, under pressure, announced a ban on the sale of fuel cars in 2035. Japanese auto companies said angrily that this is undoubtedly killing the Japanese auto industry and will cause 5.5 million Japanese auto workers to lose their jobs.

The United States does not need such a ploy as the European Union. When the car hit the US market that day, the US government negotiated directly with the Japanese government. As a result, as we all know, Japanese car companies "voluntarily" reduce their car exports to the United States, "voluntarily" use technology to help American car companies such as Ford and General Motors upgrade their industries, and "voluntarily" go to the United States to build factories, and so on. The US inflation reduction Act of 2022 kicked Japanese car companies off the list of EV subsidies. If Japanese car companies want to get the same treatment as American companies, they must go to the United States to invest and build factories.

It's a different picture in China. China's market for technology strategy has not achieved the desired results. Japanese cars make use of patent barriers, so that China has always been unable to share the technology dividend, and domestic fuel vehicles remain at the level of "high fuel consumption and poor quality", which is always difficult to break through. In this reality, Qian wrote a personal letter suggesting that the country directly skip the fuel car and directly develop the tram strategy. To some extent, it can be said that it is China's disadvantage in the field of fuel vehicles that allows China to make great progress in the field of electric vehicles without any burden.

Of course, the most important thing in China is to get through the logic of "trams are more environmentally friendly". In fact, China's electricity is also dominated by thermal power generation, and it will also face the same problem in Japan, that is, the development of trams will increase carbon emissions. The difference is that China has carried out large-scale construction at the level of new energy. At present, China accounts for 80% of the world's photovoltaic power generation, wind power accounts for 60% to 80%, lithium battery production accounts for 75% of the world, and the installed capacity of photovoltaic power in China has exceeded the installed capacity of thermal power. The supplement and replacement of new energy to thermal power generation are also being carried out at the same time, and even the price of photovoltaic power is lower than that of conventional electricity.

In this way, China's energy infrastructure provides a strong logical support for trams: the development of trams will contribute to the realization of carbon peak and carbon neutralization goals. Similarly, the United States and the European Union are also vigorously promoting the construction of new energy, while Japan, which has been going its own way, still accounts for about 80% of thermal power generation. In this context, Japanese car companies turn around to make trams, not only will not reduce emissions, but also increase carbon emissions.

It can be said that while Japan enjoys the cake on its own path, China, the United States and Europe have changed the rules and moved to another path. So, will the two paths coexist in the future? For example, China, the United States and Europe take the motorized path, while Japan takes its own hybrid route. According to the data, only 15% of Japanese car sales come from domestic and 85% from abroad, of which China, the United States and Europe account for nearly 70%. China, the United States and Europe have changed the track, and Japanese car companies have no choice but to adapt and follow.

Is there still a chance for Japanese cars? This is the current situation of Japanese cars, even fate: although they follow their own best path, they have to turn around and follow the path of the world.

It can be seen that Japanese car companies that have hit the south wall in recent years have finally begun to turn around one after another. But this U-turn is completely different from the perception that Chinese car companies believe that electric cars are the future, and Japanese companies are turning to a path that is neither suitable nor good at.

For example, Japanese cars have always questioned the unsafety, fire and explosion of liquid batteries, but now they are purchasing a large number of liquid batteries produced by Chinese and Korean enterprises such as Ningde era and LG; previously, they have been boycotting the integrated casting initiated by Tesla, believing that the quality is not up to standard and difficult to maintain, but now Toyota has begun to introduce the integrated casting mode of production. Previously, it was said that software-defined cars would not work, software bug would have fatal safety problems, and so on, but now Toyota has teamed up with other automakers to build its own software platform.

Trams are areas that rely on great efforts to achieve miracles. For example, the European Union is vigorously supporting European car companies, excluding non-European ones; the United States is vigorously supporting American car companies, excluding non-North American ones; and China has transitioned to a market-driven era, with a huge lead in the whole industry chain.

Many people think that Japan still has a chance to make a comeback, such as having a large technology reserve, such as solid-state cells, hydrogen fuel cells and so on. In fact, for example, solid-state batteries, although they sound beautiful, are just different in shape, and the raw materials they need are no different from other batteries. China also occupies an absolute leading position in the core industries such as battery raw materials to refining and processing, and even if the solid-state battery is successfully developed, it is very difficult to bypass China.

For example, Japan's hydrogen energy cars will actually encounter the same dilemma as trams, that is, Japan does not have the ability to let the world follow its own planned route, but can only adapt to the world's rules. and companies like Honda stopped the research and development of hydrogen fuel cells as early as 2021.

Japan is not without technology or strategy, it is just a lack of awareness of its own position. Japan always thinks that it is leading the development of the automobile industry, just like the wild goose array, Japan is the leading wild goose, other countries are wild goose tail, should follow and learn from themselves.

But in fact, Japanese car companies have never led the world, but the oil crisis has brought a demand for low fuel consumption, which happens to be in line with Japan's own logic. The rise of Japanese cars is just standing in the tuyere of the times. Now that the tuyere has been linked to the tram field, the logic of Japan is no longer consistent with the needs of the world.

In fact, there is nothing wrong with Japan's plan, but the world has other plans.

This article is from the official account of Wechat: automobile News Agency (ID:automobile-news), by Xia Zhuang.

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