Stable achievement of 1,000 kilometers of battery life, Zeng Yuqun, chairman of Ningde Times, said that there will be many new cars equipped with Kirin batteries next year – yqqlm

On the morning of July 21st, at the 2022 World Power Battery Conference held in Yibin, Sichuan, Zeng Yuqun, chairman of CATL, mentioned the Kirin battery recently released by CATL in his speech. Several new models will be equipped with Kirin batteries next year.

Zeng Yuqun said,In the past 10 years, the increase in energy density of power batteries has brought a 6-7 times increase in cruising range and an 80% reduction in cost. However, the recent increase in the price of upstream raw materials has led to an increase in the cost of battery companies, which has also been transmitted to battery products.

He also revealed that CATL’s market share in Europe is growing rapidly. According to the latest SNE data, CATL’s global market share reached 34% in the first half of this year. At present, the products of CATL have covered 55 countries and regions around the world, and the shipment of power batteries has exceeded 400GWh. One out of every three electric vehicles in the world is equipped with batteries from CATL.

However, Zeng Yuqun believes that mineral resources will not become a bottleneck for industrial development. In the past year or so, the hype of upstream raw materials has brought short-term troubles to the industry chain. The prices of raw materials such as lithium carbonate, PVDF, and lithium hexafluorophosphate have skyrocketed within a year. “But in fact, mineral resources are not the bottleneck of industrial development.” He emphasized that the currently proven lithium resource reserves can produce 160TWh of lithium batteries, which is fully enough to produce power batteries and energy storage batteries needed by the world. He also mentioned that CATL is strengthening the recycling of battery materials, because most of the materials in batteries can be reused. At present, the recovery rate of nickel, cobalt and manganese in CATL has reached 99.3%, and lithium has reached more than 90%. After 2035, CATL will be able to meet a large part of the market demand by recycling materials from decommissioned batteries.

In terms of R&D expenses, Zeng Yuqun revealed that each year CATL invests 6-7% of its revenue into R&D. In 2021, it has invested 7.7 billion yuan and has a R&D team of more than 10,000 people.

Recently, CATL has launched the CTP3.0 Kirin battery, which improves the integration of the battery system.1000 kilometers of range can be achieved without “stacking batteries”. Zeng Yuqun revealed that there will be a number of new models using Kirin batteries next year.