Ganfeng Lithium to invest 8.4 billion in two new lithium battery production projects, solid state batteries expansion.
The billion-dollar “lithium giant” Ganfeng Lithium (002460, SZ) has made another big move.
Ganfeng Lithium announced that it plans to invest 8.4 billion yuan with its own funds to build a new type of lithium battery project with an annual output of 15GWh.
Against the background of the outbreak of the new energy automobile industry, Ganfeng Lithium has been making every effort to open up the upstream and downstream of the lithium battery industry chain, and regard solid-state batteries as the focus of the future development of the power battery sector.
Some investors believe that the construction of this production project may be the last step for Ganfeng Lithium’s solid-state battery commercialization and mass production.
Proposed to build a new type of lithium battery project with a total annual output of 15GWh
According to reports, Jiangxi Ganfeng Lithium Battery Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Jiangxi Ganfeng), a subsidiary of Ganfeng Lithium Industry Holdings, intends to invest in two new lithium battery projects in Jiangxi and Chongqing respectively.
Among them, the Jiangxi project is located in Xinyu High-tech Industrial Development Zone, with a total investment of 3 billion yuan. The project is called “Power Battery Phase II Annual Output 5GWh New Battery Project”.
The project construction content includes a new power battery production plant and a battery research and development center. The building, product analysis and testing center complex, etc., are expected to be completed and put into production in October 2023.
The Chongqing project is located in Longxing Park, Liangjiang New District, with a total investment of 5.4 billion yuan. The project is named “Ganfeng New Lithium Battery Technology Industrial Park and Advanced Battery Research Institute Project”.
The project construction content includes the construction of a 10GWh lithium battery manufacturing base, and Through the establishment of the Advanced Battery Research Institute, it provides technical support for the technical update and product iteration of various solid-state batteries, and at the same time, jointly develops application technology research and development with downstream customers such as automobiles and consumer electronics.
Regarding the purpose of this outbound investment, Ganfeng Lithium said, “It is beneficial to increase the company’s production scale, market share and R&D capabilities of the company’s lithium battery products, close to the market and better serve core customers, and promote the optimization and upgrading of the company’s lithium industry chain structure. , To enhance the company’s core competitiveness, in line with the company’s integrated upstream and downstream development strategy.”
Layout of the solid-state battery industry chain
As soon as the news came out, most of the stockholders in the stock market cheered. Some investors said, “The new battery is a solid-state battery!” “It is clear that solid-state production is about to be expanded. The last link in the entire industry chain is also the most important link.”
The speculation and interpretation of investors stems from the fact that Ganfeng Lithium has been vigorously deploying solid-state lithium battery R&D, production and commercial applications since 2017.
In the 2020 annual report, Ganfeng Lithium also bluntly stated that “solid-state lithium battery business is the focus of the future development of Ganfeng Lithium’s power battery business sector.”
In 2017, Ganfeng Lithium established a wholly-owned subsidiary, Zhejiang Fengli New Energy Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Zhejiang Fengli), whose main business is solid-state lithium battery core materials, high-energy solid-state lithium battery cells and modules For complete process development, a solid electrolyte material engineering center was established with the Institute of Materials of Ningbo Academy of Sciences to lead the company’s solid-state battery research and development.
It also invested 250 million yuan to build a solid-state lithium battery research and development pilot production line.
In just four years, Ganfeng Lithium has been quite effective in its solid-state battery business. The 2020 annual report shows that in 2019, the company has invested in the construction of a first-generation solid-state lithium battery research and development pilot production line with an annual output of 100 million watt-hours.
From the product perspective, Zhejiang Fengli’s first-generation hybrid solid-liquid electrolyte battery products have passed a number of third-party safety tests and samples submitted by many customers; the second-generation solid-state lithium battery products have an energy density of more than 350Wh/kg and a cycle life.
Nearly 400 times; the solid-state battery cell of the metal lithium negative electrode with an energy density of more than 420Wh/kg has been applied in special fields.
In April of this year, Ganfeng Lithium announced that it plans to invest in Yichun in phases to build a 7,000-ton metal lithium and lithium material project and build a new production line for solid-state lithium battery anode materials.
At the end of July, according to a report from Shanghai Nonferrous.com, Dongfeng Technology Center officially signed a contract with Ganfeng Lithium. The two parties negotiated on solid-state battery demonstration operation cooperation and signed a solid-state battery E70 model demonstration promotion agreement. The commercial application of solid-state batteries is imminent.
Why does Ganfeng Lithium have to vigorously deploy solid-state lithium batteries? Different from the currently used liquid electrolyte lithium-ion batteries, solid-state lithium batteries are a new generation of batteries using solid electrolytes, with high energy density, and are known by the industry as the future development direction of power batteries.
Zhongtai Securities stated in the research report that, on the one hand, according to the “Made in China 2025” plan, the energy density of lithium batteries will reach 300Wh/kg by 2020, 400Wh/kg in 2025, and 500Wh/kg in 2030. According to the big lithium battery, the upper limit of the energy density of liquid batteries may be 350Wh/kg, which is difficult to meet the ultimate requirement of energy density increase.
On the other hand, traditional liquid lithium-ion batteries are prone to electrolyte leakage and electrode short-circuits, and liquid lithium-ion batteries use metal lithium as a negative electrode to increase energy density, prone to lithium dendrites, and safety issues are criticized. The battery can effectively solve these problems, and the safety performance is better.
Ganfeng Lithium intends to invest 8.4 billion to build two new lithium battery production projects. Solid-state battery expansion is valued by the outside world, August 27, 2021