Car companies start "battery equipment competition", CATL's long-life batteries become "hot cakes"

In the new energy vehicle circle, the topics of "range anxiety" and "energy replenishment anxiety" have always been the hottest topics, but in addition to these, there is another hidden anxiety that is easily overlooked, that is, "lifespan anxiety."

At present, the battery cycle life is far lower than the vehicle's mileage. According to data, the vehicle's mileage can reach 1 million kilometers, but the battery cycle life can only reach 240,000 kilometers, which is also an important reason for the low residual value rate of used new energy vehicles.

As the penetration rate of new energy vehicles increases, this problem will become more and more apparent. After the battery warranty expires, the mileage of the power battery drops significantly, and users need to spend money to repair or replace the battery, but the cost is high. Even if they replace it with a new car, the second-hand residual value rate is not high. Therefore, the power battery life problem has become a new problem in the industry and a new pain point for users.

The era of long-life power batteries is coming

Some car companies and leading power battery manufacturers have taken the lead in solving this problem and are seeking technological breakthroughs.

As early as five months ago, CATL and GAC Group officially announced that the two parties will jointly develop the "long life version" of the Shenxing supercharger battery, which will support an ultra-long battery cell warranty of 8 years or 800,000 kilometers and is expected to be officially launched in June this year.

NIO also found CATL as a partner to jointly develop power batteries with a 15-year warranty, no mileage limit, and a battery health level of no less than 85% at the end of its life.

It is understood that GM and Toyota have also proposed plans to emphasize battery life. The battery degradation of GM's related models is less than 10% after 500,000 kilometers, while that of Toyota is less than 10% after 10 years. An automotive engineer from GM said that in order to make the above battery life up to 500,000 kilometers, the team limited the charging rate to 1C, because under the same conditions, the higher the charging rate and the more frequent the fast charging, the less conducive it is to the battery life performance.

From this point of view, at a time when 800V high voltage, fast-charging batteries are becoming the new "standard" for new energy vehicles, CATL's proposal of long-life batteries must be more technically difficult.

This is precisely why OEMs have chosen CATL to jointly develop long-life batteries. Long battery life, fast charging, and long life, it is difficult for many battery manufacturers to achieve a breakthrough in just one, and now the technical level is higher if they want to have both. CATL has made major technological breakthroughs in these areas: in 2022, it launched the record-breaking Kirin battery with a battery life of over 1,000 kilometers; in 2023, it launched the Shenxing supercharger battery, which achieved 4C supercharging on lithium iron phosphate materials, and its Kirin 5C battery was officially installed on the market; in 2024, it rolled up long-life batteries again.

In the commercial vehicle sector, CATL is also promoting the application of long-life battery technology. On March 28, Yutong Group and CATL jointly released a 15-year, 1.5 million-kilometer long-life battery, which is nearly twice as long as existing conventional products.

2024 will be the first year of long-life new energy. Leading battery manufacturers led by CATL and some car companies are pushing power batteries into the era of long life.

Long-life batteries promote sustainable development of new energy

For consumers, long-life batteries will directly reduce car owners' maintenance and investment costs, greatly improve the car-using experience, and increase confidence in investing in new energy vehicles.

For car companies, they hope to rely on the innovation of power batteries to compete for the incremental market of new energy vehicles. At present, car companies have begun to bet on CATL's long-life batteries.

For the industry, long life may give birth to new business models. First, it will greatly help the development of the battery swap model. Long-life batteries will greatly save the construction and operation costs of battery swap stations and improve the profitability of enterprises. Second, it will accelerate the arrival of the B2G (two-way integration and interaction between batteries and power grids) system. Relying on the longer cycle life and more stable performance of long-life batteries, the B2G system is more economical. At that time, it may give rise to independent power battery rental operators, and individual electric car users will also be more willing to join the ranks of the B2G system.

In short, the research and development and large-scale implementation of long-life batteries led by CATL and its automotive partners is the best solution to the current pain points of new energy vehicles, and will help promote the sustainable development of the electric vehicle industry.

As a winner of Toutiao's Qingyun Plan and Baijiahao's Bai+ Plan, the 2019 Baidu Digital Author of the Year, the Baijiahao's Most Popular Author in the Technology Field, the 2019 Sogou Technology and Culture Author, and the 2021 Baijiahao Quarterly Influential Creator, he has won many awards, including the 2013 Sohu Best Industry Media Person, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Beijing Third Place, the 2015 Guangmang Experience Award, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Finals Third Place, and the 2018 Baidu Dynamic Annual Powerful Celebrity.