High nickel route for domestic power batteries

Cobalt metal prices continue to go up in 2018. Compared with 520,000 yuan/ton at the beginning of the first quarter, the increase rate in April is more than 20%. Although the increase in raw materials is affected by short-term capital speculation, the supply distribution of the whole industry is too concentrated, which will push up the price in the medium and long term. For the lithium battery and new energy vehicle industry, it is bound to start to reflect material costs quarter by quarter, which also tests whether the battery industry can adjust as soon as possible to reduce its dependence on cobalt metal.

Cobalt demand has been exacerbated by a surge in sales of new energy passenger cars

In terms of the reasons for the increase in cobalt price, the global explosion of new energy vehicles has become the main driving factor.

Analysts believe that since the second half of 2016, with the rapid development of global electric vehicles, cobalt for ternary battery has become the fastest growing and largest demand area of cobalt in the future, and cobalt has gradually entered another big cycle.

The China association of automobile manufacturers (caam) recently released march auto production and sales data. In march, sales of new energy vehicles were still outstanding, reaching 68,000 units, up 117.4 percent year-on-year.

Among these new energy vehicles, passenger vehicles with higher energy density requirements for power batteries are absolutely dominant, which further increases the demand for cobalt materials.

In fact, since the outbreak of the new energy vehicle market, especially the passenger car market, the supply shortage in the past two years is largely due to the supply side's purchase, stockpiling, inventory increase, etc. Starting from 2018, the supply is in short supply due to the growth of demand. On the other hand, uncertainty over the government's policies (a new mining law) and the precarious situation on the ground are also set to further disrupt the supply of cobalt.

In this regard, China nonferrous metal industry association cobalt industry branch deputy secretary general sun yonggang analysis that the cobalt price rise this round basically in the expected. China is a cobalt-poor country, which relies on imports of more than 90 per cent, and rising raw material costs are one factor driving up prices. In addition, the new energy power battery industry is booming, rising period, increasing demand is also the common expectation of the whole industry chain. As a result, the price of raw materials and products rose rapidly, which was also in line with the smelting enterprises' control of precious metal shipment rhythm, thus promoting the increase of cobalt price.

On the other hand, because of the introduction of the sticker policy to improve the threshold of power battery energy density, the ternary power battery will become the main choice of electric passenger cars, ternary materials nibbled the original passenger car market lithium iron phosphate, which greatly boosted the demand for cobalt.

Reducing the tendency of nickel ternary with high cobalt content

With the continuous increase of cobalt price, when the market supply of cobalt ore output is limited, the material structure of power battery is bound to have new changes.

To solve the problem of rising costs, power batteries are being pushed into high energy density products. The practice of cell factory is, apply the positive pole material such as nickel manganese cobalt and nickel cobalt aluminium actively, increase the usage amount of nickel metal, the proportion of cobalt metal will decrease gradually thereby.

The change trend can also be seen from the shipment of cathode material enterprises.

Recently, dengsheng technology recently released its annual report, the company's net profit in 2017 was 250 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 151.97%. According to its announcement, the shipment of anode materials increased by 21.7% year-on-year to reach 9,800 tons due to the price increase caused by the increase of upstream cobalt and lithium resources.

Due to the impact of the increase in cobalt price, DST technology is still disclosed in the annual report. In 2017, sanyuan 532 is the main product. It is estimated that the company will ship about 1000 tons of sanyuan high nickel in 2017, accounting for 10%.

With the trend of high nickel ternary, dengsheng technology said, 811 positive pole this year will mass production, customer development is smooth, follow-up potential.

It is understood that when rising technology power three positive pole material customers basically include domestic top ten battery manufacturers, this year the new development of several large customers. As a leading manufacturer of high nickel ternary anode materials, its 622 product scale and quality are in the forefront of the industry. Dang sheng technology also revealed that the company 811 positive pole has been mass production, the current downstream customers in the pilot phase, is expected to start the second half of the income contribution.

This also ADAPTS to the current technological change of lithium battery. According to the previous plan, the specific energy of power battery will reach 300 watt-hours/kg by 2020, with more than 1000 cycles and the cost within 0.8 yuan/watt-hours. And the positive material corresponding to this target is high nickel ternary.

Wang shaoping, general manager of fujian mengshi new energy, also said that with the development of power battery to the direction of high energy density, the field of anode materials, high nickel material capacity, low cost, the best cost performance, is in line with the mainstream trend of industrial development. However, this does not mean that all anode material enterprises can quickly turn to the direction of high nickel. The existing LFP and NCM111 or even NCM523 production lines cannot be directly switched to NCM811 or NCA production lines.

Chinese companies are poised for growth

Improving the energy density of power batteries has always been an important goal of the entire lithium battery industry. Encouraged by the new energy policy, China's power battery industry chain has achieved leapfrog development, and NCM622 and NCM811 have been promoted simultaneously. However, due to the high technical barriers of NCM811, the requirements of preparation process, equipment, production environment and supporting high-voltage electrolyte are much higher than ordinary ternary materials, and the promotion is slow. However, under the new policy environment, anode material enterprises begin to accelerate the research and development, and some enterprises have started mass production.

For example, shanshan energy announced at the end of last year that the high-nickel production line of ningxiang base with a monthly output of 100 tons was put into production smoothly, and the Shared production line of sanyuan 622/811 turnkey project of ningxia shizuishan base with an annual output of 7200 tons is expected to reach the production in March 2018. In 2017, tianjin bamo's production line with an annual output of 5000 tons of high nickel material went into production, and now it has realized the batch supply of NCM811 to big international customers.

In terms of domestic battery enterprises, bko battery takes the lead in announcing the mass production of NCM811 cylindrical power battery, and the battery energy density has been increased to 232Wh/kg, and the follow-up products of 300Wh/kg will be available soon. Penghui energy disclosed that the company has already mass produced and supplied NCM811 material 2.8ah and 3.0ah cylinder 18650 batteries to relevant vehicle manufacturers.

Guocen high-tech recently accepted the structural research, said that the company to undertake the ministry of science and technology 300wh/kg high energy density major science and technology projects are progressing smoothly, the company has developed sanyuan 811 soft package cell, the energy density reached 302wh/kg. Guoxuan high-tech has started to build the pilot production line of related products and plans to start the production line in 2019. In addition, guoxuan high-tech has decided to provide sanyuan 622 power battery for the first model developed by ford and zotye joint venture.

Comments: there is no doubt that the high-nickel route is the main improvement direction of domestic power batteries in the next stage, but it is worth noting that the high-nickel route puts forward higher requirements for technology and equipment, which will also accelerate the elimination of small and medium-sized battery enterprises. At the same time, for the superior battery enterprises, continuous technological innovation, and constantly forge ahead, is the long-term solution for the enterprise to win the future.

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