As the global green energy industry grows, emerging industries of countries around the world have been increasingly focusing on energy independence and energy saving for development. According to EnergyTrend, a research division of TrendForce, demand from the mobile phone and notebook industries has underpinned the lithium battery industry over the past decades, and the growth momentum in the next 10 years for the lithium battery industry is expected to be household energy storage system and power battery system in the electric vehicle market.
Taking the comparatively mature Japanese market for example, the latest green energy policy implemented by its government in March 2012 provides subsidies for residential energy storage system that is presumed to establish a 60 billion yen market, offering a market with significant potential for a long-term development.
While in Taiwan there are quite a number of manufacturers that have been contributing to the green energy industry in preparation to seize future business opportunities. Founded in 2009 and being one of the first-tier manufactures, Chang Hong focuses on developing lithium battery using the LFPO (Lithium Iron Phosphorous Oxide) cathode material supplied by CAEC. According EnergyTrend research, Chang Hong makes use of aqueous and stacking process on its production line that not only ensure less pollution and greater safety but also suits stand alone mode energy storage and applicable for automobile industry compared to other manufacturing process.
According to the latest release in April 2012, Chang Hong’s battery is now applicable for both electric vehicle and the energy storage system. The company has gained valuable experience through continuous tests and experiments on its products, showing positive results on both UPS and energy storage system. Chang Hong cooperates with several provinces in China on state grid projects, making use of wind and light to run the 2.5kW renewable energy storage system. Also, the company has entered the Japanese market to further expand its energy storage system, which includes 3kW and 5kW, in the residential market. These systems could be built with the smart grid and photovoltaic system and transform as one of the most influential and important storage system in the Japanese residential energy saving market.
Chang Hong adopted a diverse electric vehicle business development, on one hand cooperating with car makers and performing sampling certification, and at the same time, the company is also collaborating with power system manufacturers by remodeling current vehicle, compiling data, and verifying component certificate. In addition, Chang Hong have just successfully collaborated with Chairman Jiang of Hong Yu to develop BEV (10KWh, 96V 100Ah) (Chart 2), which can travel the furthest 100km at 120km/h. The highest output current can reach 300 Ah. Nowadays, this BEV has been delivered to Taiwan and the trial plan has been in the process. It is anticipated that after compiling all data, the product will be fully promoted to car makers.
EnergyTrend indicates that stable product quality is the key issue in the lithium battery market development. In addition, increasing battery capacity and battery energy density will not only support power battery market, which meets market’s expectation, but also aid in developing the potential household and industrial storage system markets. If lithium battery can be applied in power system market and storage system market, it is believed that the lithium battery manufacturer’s capacity can bring into play.