The development of the new energy automobile industry is in full swing under the dual-carbon goal, and lithium resources are in short supply, so accelerating power battery recycling has also become the focus of corporate layout. At present, the power battery recycling industry continues to attract all kinds of capital, in addition to car companies, power battery companies, third-party enterprises, there are many unqualified small workshops flocked to. This for the development of the industry buried environmental protection, safety and other multiple hidden dangers.
On October 20, four ministries and commissions jointly issued a notice identifying a list of 11 pilot enterprises that extend producer responsibility for automotive products. From the list, in addition to vehicle manufacturers, there are joint reporting units, including end-of-life car recycling and dismantling and power battery recycling enterprises. Meanwhile, the General Administration of Market Supervision and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology released on September 30, "on the development of new energy vehicles power battery laddering product certification (draft)", the feedback deadline for October 30th.
The power battery recycling market is expected to usher in further standardization.
Ningde Times responsible person said to the "Securities Daily" reporter, at present, the relevant departments have issued a number of guidance, to support the development of the industry's systems, regulations and documents, for the battery recycling sorted out a relatively clear direction. But how to carry out more effective management, reasonable construction of power battery recycling system, the effective implementation of the whole life cycle traceability management, to guide the industry chain upstream and downstream subjects to fulfill the responsibility of power battery recycling, etc., but also need to be combined with the government market, the industry to consider, planning, coordination.
Where do retired batteries go?
The regular army and small workshops game
2014 is known as the new energy vehicle year, if the power battery cycle of 6 to 8 years to calculate, from 2020, China began to usher in a large-scale power battery decommissioning tide.
China Automotive Technology Research Center data show that in 2020, the cumulative domestic retired power battery over 200,000 tons, the market size of 10 billion yuan. According to Tianfeng Securities estimates, from 2021 to 2030, China's decommissioning power lithium battery scale will rise from 33.95GWh to 380.3GWh, an increase of more than 10 times.
The huge market space has attracted all kinds of capital influx, Ningde Times, BYD, Greenmax, Guoxuan Gaoke and many other lithium industry chain head of listed companies actively layout. The latest data show that China's existing power battery recycling related enterprises more than 70,000. 2021, 24,000 new registrations, 2022 January to the end of September, more than 31,000 new registrations.
Behind the power battery recycling wind, is the shortage of lithium resources lead to lithium material supply and demand contradiction highlights.
Has been, China's lithium resources rely on imports, in recent years, the domestic lithium mining company to increase efforts to layout the upstream lithium resources. November 2, news that Industry Canada asked three Chinese companies to divest their lithium mining assets in Canada, triggering the relevant lithium mining concept stock shock.
With the rapid development of the new energy vehicle industry chain, lithium resources in the short term is still in short supply. 2021, the upstream raw materials due to the shortage of demand has led to a substantial increase in prices. As of November 3 this year, the price of lithium carbonate has reached 570,000 yuan / ton, renewed record high. In the power battery ushered in a large-scale decommissioning tide of background, standardize power battery recycling, improve lithium resource utilization is also increasingly important.
Ningde Times said to the reporter, lithium battery upstream raw material prices to the battery recycling industry development opportunities. Battery dismantling and recycling to achieve the value of raw material reuse highlights, will largely reduce production costs and alleviate the problem of tight supply and demand of raw materials.
And as more and more companies continue to enter the industry, the industry can be described as mixed, exposing more and more problems.
The lithium recycling industry is still at a relatively early stage, with a wide range of practitioners. Duan Zhiqiang, founding partner of Wanchuang Investment Bank, said in an interview with the Securities Daily reporter that there are both formal practitioners and small workshops. At present, most of the batteries on the market go to informal power battery recycling companies that offer high prices.
This has also become the biggest problem hindering the orderly development of the power battery recycling industry. So why are qualified, large-scale formal recycling enterprises not popular, but small-scale, unqualified small workshops occupy the majority of the market?
The Ningde Times said, because the end-of-life battery market is still the highest price, the formal recycling enterprises need to meet the environmental protection, safety and other policy and regulatory requirements, and the value of end-of-life batteries need to carry out a rigorous, scientific assessment of the value of the gradient utilization, resulting in higher costs. Some small workshops without recycling qualification production process is simple and rough, only the battery for rough disassembly, reorganization can be with safety and environmental hazards of end-of-life battery secondary sale, its cost is much lower than the regular business.
Some of the small workshops do not take environmental issues into account in the process of scrapping batteries, so they have higher returns. Wang Dezhao, head of the recycling program at Guoxuan Hi-Tech, told the Securities Daily reporter that, in contrast, the formal enterprise recycling specifications are more stringent, which not only further weakened the profitability of the formal enterprise, but also raised the cost of vehicle owners to seek recycling of end-of-life batteries in disguise.
Tianjin Saidmei New Energy Technology Co., Ltd (hereinafter referred to as Saidmei), chairman of the board of directors of the third-party company engaged in the recycling of power batteries for new energy vehicles, said in an interview with the Securities Daily reporter that in the field of power battery recycling, compared with the formal enterprises, small workshops do not have too much investment in research and development, equipment, plant and personnel, and the comprehensive management costs are very low, so they can raise the recycling price. Low, so you can raise the recycling price, so as to get more power battery supply.
At present, the channels and sources of power battery recycling are not standardized, which makes it difficult for regular enterprises to recycle enough power batteries.
Because of technical and financial constraints, there are not many companies with real qualifications. Wang Zhiwei, director of the hazardous waste management department of Sheng Yang, told the Securities Daily reporter that if individuals and unqualified enterprises recycle used power batteries at a higher price, it will not only disrupt the originally unscaled market, but also sow great environmental and safety hazards.
Who is responsible for the flow of batteries?
Property rights and responsibilities are not clear
The reason why small workshops can disrupt the market through the price, because the current flow of power battery management is still in the fuzzy zone. So who should be responsible for the final flow of power batteries?
According to the Interim Measures for the Management of Power Battery Recycling for New Energy Vehicles issued by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology in 2018, automobile manufacturers bear the main responsibility for power battery recycling, and relevant enterprises fulfill their corresponding responsibilities in various links.
In this regard, the person in charge of Ningde Times said that, in addition to the vehicle enterprises, the responsibility of the relevant enterprises interface is not clear, for example, the battery enterprise in the end what responsibility? Where is the interface between the responsibilities of vehicle manufacturers, battery manufacturers and dismantling companies? How to hand over? How to form a closed-loop management?
Duan Zhiqiang also said that the power battery as an important part of the new energy vehicles, according to who benefits who is responsible for the principle that should be the host plant or car manufacturers to be responsible for the follow-up of the retired battery processing problems, this is the first path; the second path is to comply with the production of qualified third-party battery recycling enterprises to undertake the recycling of used batteries business.
But the problem is that once a new energy vehicle is sold, the ownership belongs to the owner, and it is not yet clear how to track the vehicle battery.
Battery ownership attribution and responsibility decoupled, the vehicle enterprise is the main recycling, but the property right is the user, the vehicle enterprise and the user between the recycling of the battery business model how to establish, whether the user is willing to waste vehicles and batteries to the vehicle enterprises to deal with? Ningde Times sources mentioned.
Because there are still many difficult problems mentioned above, resulting in power battery recycling business model has not yet been established.
The business model channel is too long, the battery flow process is paid or charged? Dismantling enterprises should be dismantled to the waste battery packs to the battery manufacturers, or through market competition for the flow? The head of Ningde Times said that these uncertainties affect the establishment of the business model.
BYD sources also told the "Securities Daily" reporter that small workshops ladder products after the sale of frequent safety problems, affecting the healthy development of the industry. Due to the battery recycling business model, circulation regulations system, traceability management system is not perfect, to a certain extent, limits the recycling of waste power battery.
It is not difficult to find, in the power battery recycling industry in the early stage of development, there are two major problems need to be solved, one is for the flow of power battery, although there are regulations but more difficult to implement, which gives the small workshop operation space; the second is the property rights and responsibilities are not yet clear, the specific rules need to be refined.
Wang believes that in order to establish a perfect recycling channel, it is necessary for automobile companies, power battery companies, recycling companies, as well as government departments to collaborate with each other.
Recycling technology route has not been determined
Enterprises scrambling to layout
While the current power battery recycling industry is still in the early stages of development, the small workshop enterprises to cost and price advantage of the vast majority of the market share, but the regular business is not sitting ducks, but has been actively layout.
A number of interviewees told reporters that the development of the industry in the short term to see the competitiveness of the channel, but in the long term is still the competition of the core technology of each enterprise.
Duan Zhiqiang believes that the power battery recycling industry belongs to the long slope thick snow track, with long-term benefits, and the scale of the assets of the relevant enterprises, including the operation of the entire process of safety have more stringent requirements, so in the long term, do not have the assets, technology, equipment and other requirements of the small workshop enterprises will slowly exit the market.
Zhao Xiaoyong also holds the same view, the future of the power battery recycling market will still be occupied by the formal recycling enterprises, there are already a lot of companies have begun to lay the power battery recycling outlets across the country.
It is understood that the current power battery recycling and processing methods are mainly divided into two parts of the gradient utilization and recycling, in which the gradient utilization refers to the waste power battery pack testing, screening, restructuring and other work, and then its use in small power, small energy storage, standby power supply and other new applications. The regenerative use is the end-of-life power battery dismantling refinement, will get the more pure positive and negative materials for repair and regeneration and re-use in the manufacture of new batteries. At present, only lithium iron phosphate batteries can be utilized through the gradient again to play the residual value of ternary material batteries are still mainly dismantled and recycled.
At present, the industry is more recognized, relatively mature recycling technology route is the physical method, wet method, fire method three recycling technology route. Zhao Xiaoyong introduced to the reporter, because pyrometallurgy needs high temperature incineration, high energy consumption, so the domestic basically use wet metallurgy technology. The physical recycling process is short, the dismantling process will not use incineration, do not add acid and alkali and other strong irritating substances, is environmentally friendly green recycling technology, can be achieved near the recycling.
The three technology routes have their own advantages and disadvantages, enterprises in the process of running the horse, but also faced with different power battery manufacturers, dismantling technology is complex, high cost, recycling policy system industry chain is not perfect and other problems.
September 16, in the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology held a series of thematic press conference on the development of industry and information technology in the new era, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said that it will accelerate the study and development of new energy vehicles power battery recycling management methods, increase the flexible dismantling of decommissioned batteries, high efficiency recycling and promotion of key technologies, accelerate the introduction of a number of national standards for recycling of power batteries, industry standards.
Establishing a traceability system has become a **** knowledge
Industrial chain parties to make suggestions
In order to deal with the various chaotic phenomena in the power battery recycling market, a number of enterprises said that the traceability of power batteries and full-cycle management should be increased in every aspect of the relevant responsibility for the main body is clear.
BYD said it expects the relevant parties to improve the battery recycling business model, circulation regulations system and traceability management system.
The follow-up policy should fully implement the extended producer responsibility system to truly realize who produces who is responsible. Ningde Times also suggested that the vehicle enterprises are the main recycling of end-of-life vehicles, battery companies are the main recycling of end-of-life batteries, that is, before the separation of vehicle and power, the main body of responsibility is the vehicle enterprises, vehicle and power after the separation of the main body of responsibility is the battery business, clear responsibility interface and battery flow, conducive to the rapid establishment of a business model, the formation of the recycling industry system. In addition, it is necessary to form a binding mechanism through economic means.
In 2018, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology announced the first batch of five companies in line with the "new energy automobile waste power battery comprehensive utilization of industry norms and conditions" list, followed by the addition of two new batches, as of now, the requirements of the formal enterprise whitelist has increased to 47.
In the management of the whole life cycle of power battery recycling, it can be divided into the use of the link and the end-of-life link two blocks. The person in charge of Ningde Times believes that the use of the link, the vehicle factory plays a more important role in the channel, due to the high professionalism of the power battery, the market free access to spare parts is difficult, the vehicle malfunctions or accidents, the owner can often only go to the vehicle company's distribution and recycling service network can be carried out to repair and replace the battery, and thereafter the vehicle factory will be handed over to the battery or resale of the battery to the power battery production enterprises. In the end-of-life segment of the used battery, the ownership of the power battery is first transferred from the user to the automobile scrapping and dismantling enterprises, and the automobile scrapping and dismantling enterprises will then transfer or resell the power battery to the power battery production enterprises. Therefore, the recycling of power batteries is basically done by power battery manufacturers or white-listed enterprises.
In fact, the clear responsibility of each link main body, the establishment of power battery traceability system has become the industry **** knowledge.
Duan Zhiqiang believes that the power battery recycling industry has not yet established a complete supervision and management system. First of all, to clarify the main responsibility, there is a way to track traceability, each power battery has an individual file, from production, use to subsequent decommissioning, as well as the subsequent gradient utilization, the entire life cycle needs to be recorded; secondly, to establish a sound operating mechanism, including marketing channels, recycling network, recycling system, improve the linkage and coordination of the various aspects of the responsibility of the main body should be a certain degree of protection measures.
In addition to the establishment of a traceability system, in the current development of the industry, to strengthen the punishment of non-compliant enterprises is also the industry chain of all parties **** the same demand.
Greenland Beauty sources told the Securities Daily reporter that in terms of market standardization, it is hoped that a formal management approach will be introduced as soon as possible to increase the punishment of non-compliant enterprises.
Zhao Xiaoyong also mentioned that to further regulate the market, one from the source to block, there is a source of enterprises to stand on their own, the source of goods to the national certification of the normative enterprises, or will face credit or other aspects of the punishment; the second is to regulate the category or white list of enterprises to take up the responsibility of a large enterprise, do not go to collect the waste batteries of small workshops.
Small workshops of grabbing food not only to the formal recycling enterprises has brought serious negative impact, but also to China's new energy automobile industry's sustainable development and international competitiveness has brought great hidden danger. Ningde Times said the above person in charge of the hope that the relevant departments to guide the flow of end-of-life batteries and recycled materials to the regular recycling enterprises and battery enterprises as a guide, strengthen the management of end-of-life batteries flow of automobile dismantling and dismantling enterprises, laddering and utilization of enterprises, the strict implementation of the requirements of traceability management of the whole life cycle, increase the penalties, and set the threshold of entry into the end-of-life industry, to guide the end-of-life power batteries back to the recycling of qualified enterprises. This will help the industry to form a sustainable development mechanism.
Wang Dezhao said he expects the relevant policies and norms to be implemented as soon as possible to support the layout of the recycling business of formal enterprises. At the same time, it is also expected that the relevant policies and norms can be combined with the development needs of the whole industrial chain in the field of power battery, to support the development of industrial chain integration.