Electric car maker BYD shifts to ternary batteries

Want China Times, Staff Reporter 2015-08-20

A BYD mockup car on display at Beijing International Automotive
Exhibition, April 25, 2012. (File photo/Xinhua)

A recent government document on electric vehicles indicates that Shenzhen-based electric car maker BYD may have shifted its position on the type of fuel cell used in its products, according to Shanghai's China Business News.

China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) on Aug. 14 published its 72nd catalog of energy-saving and new energy vehicles covered by government subsidies, which include a BYD model "BYD6460STHEV."

The BYD model is believed to be the company's Song model, which is set to hit the market in the third quarter, according to the newspaper.

The model's specs show that the car uses lithium nickel cobalt aluminum oxide (NCA) cells produced by BYD's battery unit in Huizhou. This means that the company, which focuses on lithium iron phosphate (LFP) cells, has successfully developed a type of ternary battery.

After years of efforts, BYD has become China's leading company in terms of LFP technology, but since 2014, the sector has been moving toward ternary batteries which have higher specific energy and longer calendar life, the paper said.

BDY's cell production, the fourth-largest in the world with a 6% market share in 2014, is seen as a factor behind the company's dominance in the new energy car business in China.

Electric car maker Tesla, which uses NCA cells, is building a factory in Nevada that is set to begin production in 2017 and reach full capacity of 50 gigawatt-hours per year by 2020, the newspaper said.

According to EV Sales Blog rankings, Japan's Matsushita is leading the lithium cell market with a 38% share; followed by AECS, a joint venture between Nissan and NEC; and LG Chem.

Although BYD managed to halve the size and weight of the LFP cells in its latest Qin model and has pushed the energy density to 130 watt-hour per kilogram (wh/kg), it is still off the mark in terms of the Ministry of Science and Technology's requirements that the energy density of electric car batteries should reach 200 wh/kg by the end of the year, the newspaper noted.

The requirement for higher energy density makes ternary batteries more appealing in the sector, the newspaper said.

Some companies that made LFP cells, including Tianjin Lishen Battery and China Aviation Lithium Battery, have begun production of ternary batteries, according to the newspaper.

A BYD executive said the company is already using ternary batteries in the handsets its manufactures under contract for other enterprises, and would not rule out the possibility of using such cells in cars.