"Bang!" "Bang!" "Bang!" A man is swinging a hammer in his hand and hammering hard at a tray full of new energy vehicle power batteries, trying to disassemble the battery pack placed in the tray. The man is a worker in a waste power battery recycling factory. His factory, located in Dongguan, employs less than 30 people. The total area of the factory is only about the size of a basketball court. It has been filled with waste power batteries purchased. The boss said he would like more such batteries.
"We'll take as much as you have." In the factory's office, the boss said, "all payments are cash."
These disassembled power batteries will be divided into two categories according to their quality: the better ones will be used in echelon utilization; The worse ones are sold to other factories or traders for other purposes, such as refining the valuable metal in the cell for recycling.
There are tens of thousands of factories like this in the country, and most of them have only been established in the past two years. They are called "small workshops" or "black workshops" in the industry. Up to now, only 45 waste battery recycling enterprises have entered the white list of the Ministry of industry and information technology.
Since 2021, the prices of raw materials such as nickel, cobalt and lithium have continued to soar, and the recycling price of power batteries has soared. Therefore, retired new energy vehicle power batteries have become the first target for recycling enterprises. Driven by huge interests, small workshops and black workshops are springing up everywhere, and waste power batteries are purchased at a price higher than the normal price of the market.
In the hot market, there is a strange phenomenon: the production of "regular army" is in the dilemma of "insufficient food", and the industry calls "bad money expels good money".
Small workshop site: original operation
On the afternoon of May 11, the first financial reporter made an unannounced visit to a waste power battery factory in Dongguan as a "supplier".
The factory is located in a remote industrial park in Dongguan, the "world factory". The park consists of several old buildings. The plant is on the second floor of one of the four story buildings. The reporter learned that in the industrial park alone, there are at least three small factories for recycling waste power batteries.
The factory building is divided into three workshops, of which the outermost one is neatly stacked with disassembled and assembled second-hand power batteries; The middle one is mainly used for the disassembly of waste power batteries; The innermost part is used for the detection, processing, assembly and packaging of disassembled waste power batteries.
In the face of workers brandishing a hammer and smashing the waste power battery tray, the reporter was full of doubts, "aren't you afraid of causing battery explosion?" The worker who swung the hammer smiled and said, "what are you afraid of? As long as you don't hit the battery."
Another worker beside him is using the fire in the brazier to separate the metal sheets in the tray from some plastics. "These (pieces of metal) can be sold there." The worker said. The so-called brazier is very simple. It is a four square waste iron box the size of a baby bathtub, in which firewood is burned.
The brazier is placed closest to the window of the plant. In front of the window is a whistling exhaust fan, which aims to discharge the black smoke and odor generated by the combustion of plastic from the plant. Even so, a strong pungent smell of burning plastic was clearly smelled in the plant.
None of the workers in the plant wore masks or specific protective clothing.
Li Mingde stopped the first financial reporter from going to shoot with his mobile phone. "Recently, the environmental protection department has checked closely."
The factory is jointly invested by three bosses, all from the same place in eastern Guangdong. Among the nearly 30 employees in the factory, most of them are from the same hometown as the three bosses, and some are relatives, except that a very small number of employees are from Guangxi, Guizhou and other places. This is also a typical "small workshop" personnel composition mode.
In the workshop of testing, processing, assembly and packaging, the first financial reporter saw that there were two or three old testing machines with workers wearing short sleeves doing testing. The so-called detection is to check the capacity and quality of the disassembled power battery and classify it on this basis.
After the detection and classification, the processing personnel will simply process the power battery with better quality and make the battery look newer. Then, the assembler will rearrange and assemble the battery packs according to the customer's needs.
After all this is done, other workers will pack the power battery. A second-hand power battery is generated.
In the above production links, all workers did not wear masks and gloves, let alone relevant protective clothing. They seem to be indifferent to the potential hazards that waste power batteries may cause.
Source and destination
The acquisition of waste power batteries requires certain experience accumulation and relevant professional knowledge. Chen Kaijian, Li Mingde's colleague and fellow townsman, is an "elite" with such professional ability.
"There are some waste power batteries. You can probably know their quality only by touching them with your hand." Chen Kaijian said, but the most important thing is to look at the battery parameters, model, brand and the information that the battery has run most kilometers in the car.
When the reporter asked where the waste power batteries piled up in the factory came from, Chen Kaijian said: "there are many sources. Some are bought from auto 4S stores, some from waste recycling stations, some from private hands, some from other special channels, but there are many."
To this end, Chen Kaijian often patronizes various auto 4S stores to talk to people. He said that as long as the price is higher than the 45 waste battery recycling enterprises on the white list of the Ministry of industry and information technology, they can easily buy it back. "The average electricity consumption per kilowatt hour will be 20 to 50 yuan higher than that of large enterprises." He said.
The power battery capacity of new energy vehicles is generally in the range of 50 to 100kwh (1kwh = 1 KWH). This means that the price of a small factory like Chen Kaijian's to buy a waste power battery of a new energy vehicle will be 5000 yuan higher than that of a large enterprise at the highest.
Even so, the profits of small factories are still considerable. Because compared with regular large enterprises, the production condition of this small factory is almost primitive, and the cost of environmental protection treatment is almost zero.
Like the channels for purchasing waste power batteries, there are many places for the second-hand power batteries reassembled by Chen Kaijian's sales factory. These destinations include: solar power storage, RV, boat machine, household standby power supply, low-speed electric vehicle and so on. Among them, low-speed electric vehicles include four-wheel vehicles, tricycles and two wheel vehicles. Among the two wheeled vehicles, there is a large demand for electric vehicles for delivery.
For those poor quality waste power batteries, sales personnel such as Chen Kaijian will sell them to other waste power battery recycling plants or traders. One of the traders is on the roof of the factory. "After they buy poor quality batteries from us, they will reassemble them and then sell them to Africa and other regions at a high price." "Their business is doing well," Chen said
After other battery recycling factories purchase those waste power batteries with poor quality from here, they generally discharge, disassemble and crush the batteries, extract valuable power battery metal materials such as nickel, cobalt and lithium from the battery cell, then sell them to the market, and finally flow back to the power battery manufacturers.
The salesperson of a waste power battery recycling factory in Huizhou, Guangdong told the first financial reporter that the factory specializes in extracting nickel, cobalt and lithium from electric cells, but these businesses are finally transferred to inland provinces for processing.
New enterprises soared six times a year
Behind the hot recycling of waste power batteries is the rapid progress of China's new energy vehicles, resulting in the short supply of power batteries and their raw materials.
Since 2021, the prices of nickel, cobalt, lithium and other power battery raw materials have suddenly and continuously soared, and the recycling price of waste power batteries has also risen. Since this year, the price of power battery grade lithium carbonate has exceeded 500000 yuan / ton, and the price of lithium hydroxide has also exceeded 480000 yuan / ton. In one year, the prices of both have soared 10 times. "Almost one price a day." Chen Kaijian said.
According to relevant reports, the scrapping life of power batteries of operating new energy vehicles in China is 3 to 5 years, and the scrapping cycle of power batteries of private passenger vehicles is 5 to 8 years. According to this calculation, around 2021 is the peak of the first round of power battery retirement. At the same time, due to the surge in the installed capacity of power batteries in 2021, the scrap volume of batteries will increase rapidly around 2027.
The research report from East Asia Qianhai securities shows that by 2030, the total scale of power batteries to be recycled may reach 2.37 million tons, including 1.53 million tons of lithium iron phosphate batteries and 840000 tons of ternary batteries. At that time, the recycling market space of power batteries will reach 107.43 billion yuan.
More and more people are attracted to join the waste battery recycling industry.
According to the data of enterprise information query platforms such as tianyancha, there are currently 38500 power battery recycling related enterprises in China, including 3321 new power battery recycling related enterprises in 2020, a year-on-year increase of 143%; In 2021, 24400 new companies were added, with a year-on-year increase of 635%.
Facing the rush of many small factories and workshops, there are few retired power batteries that really flow to formal channels. Data show that in 2020, China's total decommissioned power batteries exceeded 200000 tons, but only about 30000 tons went to formal channels, and more than 100000 tons of decommissioned power batteries went to informal channels.
In an interview with China first finance and economics, Bangpu cycle, the leading waste battery recycling giant in China, said that since the scrap battery market is still "the one with the highest price", regular recycling enterprises need to meet the requirements of environmental protection, safety and other policies and regulations, and rigorous and scientific evaluation is needed for waste batteries with echelon utilization value, resulting in higher costs. The production process of small workshops is simple and rough. Only rough disassembly and reorganization of batteries can sell scrapped batteries with potential safety and environmental protection hazards for the second time, and its cost is far lower than that of regular enterprises. As a result, in the scrap battery recycling market, the bid of small workshops is far superior to that of regular enterprises, which actually forms a market environment in which bad money expels good money.
Zhang Tianren, chairman of Tianneng group, a leading enterprise in the domestic new energy battery industry, had previously said, for example, that at present, the cost of recycling one ton of waste lithium iron phosphate power battery in China is 8540 yuan, but the income from renewable materials is only 8110 yuan and the loss is 430 yuan.
Both Bangpu cycle and Tianneng group are enterprises on the "white list" of the Ministry of industry and information technology of the people's Republic of China. It is not easy to enter the "white list". At least more than 50 review conditions need to be met. At the same time, it is also necessary to ensure that environmental protection and safety facilities are complete, and there are even rigid regulations in storage, transportation and other aspects.
Bangpu cycle told the first financial reporter that the rush of small workshops not only has a serious negative impact on formal recycling enterprises, but also brings huge hidden dangers to the sustainable development and international competitiveness of China's new energy vehicle industry. "It is hoped that relevant departments will guide the flow of scrapped batteries and recycled materials to formal recycling enterprises and battery enterprises, strengthen the flow management of scrapped batteries for automobile scrapping and dismantling enterprises and echelon utilization enterprises, strictly implement the requirements of full life cycle traceability management, increase the punishment, set the entry threshold of scrapped industry, guide the return of scrapped power batteries to qualified recycling enterprises, and help the industry form a sustainable development mechanism System. "
(Li Mingde and Chen Kaijian are pseudonyms in the text) author / Nan Ying