By ZHUANG Jian
Chinese battery maker China Aviation Lithium Battery Co., Ltd (CALB)’s latest one-stop (OS) battery has gone into production. On April 23, the first OS lithium iron phosphate battery left China Aviation Lithium Battery’s Guangdong plant.
Energy density is a critical determinant of the range of EVs. The new CALB OS battery has a system density of 153 Wh/kg, the highest of any lithium iron phosphate (LFP) battery in mass production, providing a range of 600 kilometers.
Because of their low cost and high safety, low toxicity, long cycle life and other factors, LFP batteries have a number of roles.
LFP batteries take about a third of the EV market, with about two-thirds of that demand coming from Tesla and BYD. China’s EV sales almost doubled in 2022 and now account for one in four cars sold in the country, nearly 59 percent of global EV sales.
CALB has previously released an OS lithium manganese iron phosphate battery and an OS battery suitable for energy storage applications. Thanks to its compact structure, good safety record and low cost, CALB’s EV battery has become the industry standard.
CALB is a leading manufacturer of lithium-ion batteries in China, covering both power and storage batteries. Eight major production bases have a total capacity of 50 GWh, at a cost of 20 billion yuan. CALB’s first overseas factory is planned in Portugal.
In 2020, 98 percent of CALB's revenue came from the domestic market, with its largest customer being GAC Group. In the first quarter of 2022, CALB overtook Samsung to rank sixth in the global EV battery market.
