I don't know if you have found it, now when you buy new energy vehicles, lithium iron phosphate batteries have become the mainstream.
According to the data released by the China Automotive Power Battery Industry Innovation Alliance, in May 2024, the installed volume of lithium iron phosphate batteries was 29.5GWh, a year-on-year increase of 54.1%, accounting for 74.0% of the total installed volume, and the market share of lithium iron phosphate batteries exceeded 70%.
In addition, in the field of energy storage, according to the statistics of Zhongguancun Energy Storage Industry Technology Alliance, lithium iron phosphate batteries are the main energy storage batteries, accounting for 94.4%.
And just a few years ago, lithium iron phosphate batteries have always been synonymous with "cheap and backward" in the eyes of many people, and their market share is not as good as ternary batteries.
The energy density is improved, and the gap with ternary batteries is narrowed
From 2009 to 2016, with the introduction of policies such as "ten cities and thousands of vehicles", the mainland's new energy vehicle industry developed rapidly, during this period, lithium iron phosphate batteries dominated, because a large part of them are relatively large commercial vehicles, which are not sensitive to energy density (including volume and mass two dimensions), but very sensitive to safety, at this time lithium iron phosphate batteries are more suitable.
In order to improve the technical level of the industry, the subsidy policy in 2016 began to include the energy density of the battery system in the assessment criteria: the minimum threshold of no less than 90Wh/kg was set for the mass energy density of the power battery system of pure electric passenger vehicles, and the subsidy was 1.1 times that of the battery system higher than 120Wh/kg.
Judging from the actual situation at that time, most of the lithium iron phosphate batteries were concentrated around 90Wh/kg, and ternary batteries generally exceeded 90Wh/kg, and many exceeded 120Wh/kg, which could get 1.1 times the subsidy.
Soon by the end of 2018, the share of ternary batteries had reached 70%. It was also at this time that CATL, which bet on ternary batteries, began to rise, and BYD was a little "invisible".
However, with the improvement of battery chemical materials and packaging technology, the energy density of batteries has been rapidly improved with the advent of the CTP 1.0 and 2.0 eras. A representative model here is the Han EV, which was launched in 2020, equipped with BYD's blade battery, with a system energy density of 140Wh/kg, a battery capacity of 76.9kWh, and a NEDC range of 605km.
By 2024, lithium iron phosphate batteries will be able to meet most of the needs, and CATL has also launched the Shenxing battery PLUS (a lithium iron phosphate battery), with a system energy density of 205Wh/kg, a cruising range of more than 1000km, and support 4C overcharging. At the same time, BYD's second-generation blade battery is also about to be released, which is said to have an energy density of 190Wh/kg.
Of course, on the whole, the energy density of ternary batteries is still higher (including two dimensions of mass and volume), if you want to install 100kWh or even higher capacity, you still have to choose ternary batteries, such as Xiaomi SU7 Max, ideal MEGA, Zeekrypton 009, all three are equipped with ternary Kirin batteries of the CATL era, with battery capacities of 101kWh, 102.7kWh, and 116/140kWh respectively, which are difficult to fit into lithium iron phosphate batteries of this capacity.
However, on the whole, lithium iron phosphate batteries can meet most of the needs, and ZEEKR 001 can also fit a 95kWh Ningde Shenxing battery.
After energy density is not a big problem, lithium iron phosphate batteries are basically advantages.
Safe, long life, low cost, lithium iron phosphate has many benefits
From the microscopic level, the positive electrode of lithium iron phosphate is a olivine-like three-dimensional structure, which is still relatively stable at high temperatures, while the cathode of ternary batteries is a layered structure, which is relatively less stable.
Of course, the safety of the battery is a systematic project, in addition to the positive electrode of the cell, the electrolyte, separator, battery thermal management, explosion-proof valve, exhaust design, etc. will affect the safety of the final electric vehicle, so it is not necessarily that the ternary battery vehicle is not as safe as lithium iron phosphate, but to achieve the same safety specifications, the cost of ternary must be higher, and it will eventually be reflected in the price.
According to the latest data from Zeyan Consulting, the price of lithium iron phosphate batteries is 380 yuan/kWh, and the price of high-nickel ternary batteries is 550 yuan/kWh, and ternary batteries are 44.7% more expensive than lithium iron phosphate, and if it is a 100kWh battery, ternary batteries are 17,000 yuan more expensive than lithium iron phosphate in terms of cells.
In addition to safety and low cost, lithium iron phosphate also has a big advantage is long life, which refers to the cycle life, at present, the ternary lithium battery of the large factory can reach 1000-2000 cycles, at the same time, the lithium iron phosphate battery can generally reach more than 2000 times, some can reach more than 3500 times, if it is supplied to the energy storage market, the number of cycles can reach more than 4500-5000 times.
Here for the "long life", lithium iron phosphate also has a hidden advantage, that is, the lithium iron phosphate battery can be fully charged every time, but the ternary battery is generally only recommended to be fully charged to 90% or even 80%, for example, Tesla recommends that the owner of the four-wheel drive long-range version is only charged to 80% for daily use, which is also considered for the life of the battery. Of course, if you want to go far away, you still have to fill it directly.
Inaccurate SOC calibration and poor low-temperature performance can be solved by algorithms and thermal management
With so many benefits, lithium iron phosphate also has two disadvantages that are not so critical, one is that the SOC power estimate is not very accurate, and the other is poor low-temperature performance.
First of all, the problem of inaccurate SOC power estimation is mainly due to the innate charging and discharging characteristics of lithium iron phosphate LFP batteries that the voltage is too high, and the voltage is similar at 10%-90%, which makes it difficult to use the open-circuit voltage to correct the value of SOC. To solve this problem, car companies will recommend that car owners charge once or more times a week to calibrate.
However, with the advancement of technology, car companies have been able to accurately estimate the SOC power of lithium iron phosphate batteries, such as NIO's latest 75kWh battery pack is already pure lithium iron phosphate, and the previous 75kWh battery pack has added some ternary batteries to calibrate the power. Ideal's latest car L6 also uses lithium iron phosphate batteries, and in 2020, Li Xiang publicly said that "lithium iron phosphate is a disaster when used in plug-in hybrid range extension", 4 years have passed, Li Xiang just wants to say "really fragrant" to lithium iron phosphate.
Then there is the problem that lithium iron phosphate is more "afraid of cold", with the higher and higher level of thermal management of car companies, the battery can basically work at a suitable temperature, many vehicles of more than 200,000 are also equipped with heat pump air conditioning, and Tesla's "octopus" is not so fresh now.
In addition, the batteries of BYD and some car companies also have a pulse self-heating function, which does not rely on the outside world to heat you but uses high-frequency current to heat through resistance, which is equivalent to relying on "doing push-ups yourself" to warm up, so that the heating efficiency is high and it is more economical.
Overall, lithium iron phosphate has three advantages: low cost, long life and congenital thermal runaway, especially the cost, which is very critical at the moment when the price war is intensifying, and its energy density, SOC calibration, and low temperature performance disadvantages have been made up with technological progress, and from the perspective of development trends, the share of domestic lithium iron phosphate is expected to reach more than 80%. At present, the overseas market is still dominated by ternary batteries, but it is also slowly switching to iron and lithium, and the current export of battery ternary and lithium iron phosphate is basically 50:50, and the development of overseas new energy vehicles is still several years behind the country.