After several months of delay, Tesla Berlin auto factory finally obtained key regulatory approval on Friday. The German local government has given conditional approval to the Tesla plant, which will allow the American electric vehicle giant to start commercial production.
Tesla's battery production plant was also approved at the same time as the Berlin automobile plant. Tesla originally planned to produce electric vehicles in Brandenburg near Berlin last summer and deliver them to European customers, but the plan was delayed by the covid-19 epidemic, complex supply chain and strict environmental supervision of battery production.
Last October, when Tesla CEO musk attended the inauguration ceremony of Tesla Berlin super factory, he said that once the Berlin super factory is fully put into operation, it will produce 500000 electric vehicles every year and generate a battery capacity of 50 gigawatt hours (GWH), which will exceed the capacity of any other automotive battery factory in Germany.
Before the Berlin plant was approved, Tesla succumbed to environmental pressure and agreed to reduce the water consumption of its new plant by more than a third. Previously, Tesla also suspended construction because it needed to prove that the plant would not affect hibernating snakes and lizards in the area.
Before Tesla Berlin factory was officially put into operation, Tesla Shanghai Super factory was the company's third super factory in the world and the first super factory in the United States overseas, and became an important export hub in markets such as Germany and Japan. In January this year, Tesla sold nearly 60000 cars in China, of which more than 40000 were exported.
In addition to Tesla's plan to establish a super factory in Berlin, it will also be similar to Tesla's design and development center in Germany.
At the same time, Tesla is also increasing the expansion of Chinese production. Earlier this month, Tesla submitted documents that showed that the company planned to start the construction of a new factory in Shanghai as early as next month, so as to more than double China's production capacity to meet the growing demand of the Chinese market and export market.
According to the latest research report of canalys, a research institution, a total of 6.5 million electric vehicles were sold worldwide in 2021, including 4.5 million pure electric vehicles. Europe and China are the two largest markets for electric vehicles. Last year, the sales of electric vehicles in Europe reached 2.3 million, accounting for nearly 20% of all new car sales, of which Tesla accounted for more than half of all electric vehicle sales in Europe, reaching 54%.
Zhang Junyi, managing partner of Aowei consulting, told China Business News: "by 2030, the penetration rate of electric vehicles is expected to be 30% to 40%, but it still depends on the perfection of regulations and infrastructure, as well as whether the safety and density of batteries can be further improved."
According to the Deloitte report, the global sales of electric vehicles will exceed 30 million by 2030, which means that the sales of electric vehicles will increase tenfold on the current basis in the next decade.
As the core of the development of electric vehicles, battery production has been paid more and more attention by the industrial chain. Although Tesla still accounts for less than 1% of global sales, the company says it has purchased up to 26% of the batteries in the automotive industry. Tesla has been able to realize the reuse rate of battery raw material metal as high as 92%.
Panasonic, a long-term supplier of Tesla, has said that it plans to start mass production of Tesla's new lithium-ion battery 4680 by March 2024. This battery is about five times the battery capacity currently supplied by Panasonic to Tesla, which will help Tesla reduce production costs and improve vehicle mileage. Previously, South Korea LG was also exposed to plan to produce 4680 batteries for Tesla.
As Tesla accelerates the layout of European electric vehicle production, it will also drive a large number of European battery suppliers in the future. German chemical giant BASF predicted last September that with the surge in electric vehicle production, its battery material revenue will exceed 1.5 billion euros by 2023 and 7 billion euros by 2030. BASF is increasing investment in key raw materials of batteries in Canada, Japan and other countries.
According to a forecast report of S & P global rating, by 2025, the power battery demand of light electric vehicles, including pure electric vehicles and plug-in hybrid vehicles, is expected to increase eightfold on the basis of 2020, with the power battery demand of about 139gwh in 2020.
"The battery industry has entered a stage of rapid change. With the rapid replacement of traditional vehicles by electric vehicles, battery enterprises are facing huge growth opportunities, which requires a large amount of early investment in battery standards." Chen Zhihao, credit analyst at S & P global rating, told China business news. He added that although Europe and the United States are actively building battery capacity, batteries may still be in short supply.
