New solid-state battery plant sparks overcapacity fears in China as cell supply is forecast to surpass demand 4x

[Redaktion]

A surprise solid-state battery factory announcement has managed to rekindle overcapacity worries in China. Being home of the world's biggest battery makers, China will soon produce four times the amount of EV cells that the local auto industry can utilize.

https://www.notebookcheck.net/New-solid-state-battery-plant-sparks-overcapacity-fears-in-China-as-cell-supply-is-forecast-to-surpass-demand-4x.740941.0.html

[Hunter2020]

Another variant of China-about-to-collapse theory?

[Dsa]

So what are they worried about? Honestly it just sounds like they don't want China producing so many so they can keep prices high. The more made, the cheaper they'll be.

[T. R. Thomas]

And your point is...? Oversupply now will lead to lower prices for batteries for EV manufacturers who, in turn, can lower the cost of EVs to buyers, thus increasing EV sales, replacing ICE cars faster. As demand increases, supply would already be there.

[t4n0n]

So what are they worried about?

The article is a little confusing on this front, as it says the worries regarding this are being felt in China, but then brings up the (obvious) negative impact that such a global oversupply would have on the fledgling Western battery manufacturing efforts...

To be honest, one gets the feeling that this "worry" may be of the "Oh no! Anyway..." kind...

[hugh mungus]

And your point is...? Oversupply now will lead to lower prices for batteries for EV manufacturers who, in turn, can lower the cost of EVs to buyers, thus increasing EV sales, replacing ICE cars faster. As demand increases, supply would already be there.

Oh my sweet summer child, you really think they'd pass the savings onto the consumer instead of just taking a larger profit margin?

[Numan]

You'll have to forgive me for saying but this whole article seems a little hog-wash. No offense.

Firstly I thought the title was intentionally contradictory to make it more enticing but it seems there's a few unintentional errors, the obvious one being if cell supply is set to surpass the demand where exactly is the over-capacity?

Correct me if I'm mistaken but my assumption is most EV battery capacity in the market today and onward into the future will sit around/between 65 & 105 in my opinion; that's taking today's battery technology and the future iteration in battery advancements solid-state and what-have-you, this is so end-product pricing and adequate battery capacity implementation is ideal for both the manufacturer & consumer. Taking that into account if the average modern EV has and will continue to have at least 65Kwh, a battery company producing 40Gwh would be able to supply around 615,000 cars annually not forgetting some if not most cars will have slightly over 65Kwh i.e between 75 & 105 Kwh. Note I excluded heavy duty vehicles that are likely to have a much higher capacity mainly to counter the mass of the vehicle but also because it would mainly be a commercial car.

Honestly speaking, I think in the future we won't see any car containing anything less than 70Kwh and any car above 105kwh, with the minor exception of commercial based cars. Personally speaking I think heavy duty trucks like the Hummer EV and the very few similar cars like it containing an abnormal amount of batteries above 150Kwh is ridiculous and it should be taken into account that it is mostly due to offset the weight of the entire vehicle itself rather than add range.

Things I feel the article should have been clear about:

- 'incredulous Gwh supply' in cells, for a startup 10Gwh it is understandable but if you're confident in the solution and given that solid-state solutions are genuinely expected to be the best thing for the foreseeable future it doesn't make much sense.

- 'over-capacity issue' coherently speaking and for the foreseeable future cannot be construed as an issue because the demand for it is so excessive that you mustn't forget about the standalone energy storage solutions as well because that sector alone could arguably out weight the demand for the typical EV sector alone.

- Davis Zhang's comment of "a 10GWh capacity is not a small battery production project", umm...technically speaking, yes, it is small if you're going to be supplying to just one particular company and nobody else. Furthermore, if their initial customers is going to be a vehicle manufacturer, they (as in 'one' company) will likely procure their entire capacity & it is also important to take into account what is the size of their batteries and what kind of batteries they will be i.e configured for the EV market or a smaller consumer market.

With all the R&D that has gone into solid-state technological energy solutions, we typically think, yay, more advanced batteries for EVs but I supposed most of us (maybe just me:) don't think about the typical consumer electronics market i.e laptops, home energy & many other things, so I guess an indication of some kind such if the minimum for an EV going forwards would be 65kwh, a 10Gwh plant would on average be able to supply enough cells for around 150,000 cars i.e enough for one EV company or two to three startups, however, if configuring the cells for the non-EV market 10Gwh does seem adequate for the not so advanced cell market.

- "..China which will be producing 4,800GWh of batteries by 2025". Again not to sound rude but if you've followed or work in the energy industry, you would realize what a radical statement that is because that's almost 5 terawatts. If in 2020 Tesla's new battery plant that was going to create a capacity of 250Gwh and that was estimated to be the global supply already, assume that it is complete today round up today's existing supply, so essentially double it, that would come up 500Gwh, that's half a terawatt hour; citing that China would increase the capacity by around 8 or 9 fold is beyond hyperbolic don't you think? I mean it is achievable but very extreme.

The most recent figures I read the global battery supply was just over 700Gwh and is estimated by 2025 to reach just over 1400Gwh/1.4Twh; to my understanding that is the estimated global capacity, so the figure of 4.8Twh as you imagine comes across as hyperbolic as it's over triple the current capacity pardon the pun.