NEWS

In recent years, under the background of "double carbon", China's carbon fiber production capacity has expanded significantly. In the near future alone, relevant enterprises have issued a number of announcements concerning the expansion of carbon fiber production, and more and more enterprises have or will have a production capacity of 10000 tons. A number of research institutions have pointed out that in recent years, China's carbon fiber capacity has expanded significantly, the capacity utilization rate has increased rapidly, and the localization substitution has accelerated, which is good news for the promotion of China's "dual carbon" goal. However, some market participants warned that some low-end carbon fibers may face the risk of overcapacity.

Accelerated layout of leading enterprises

Since this year, many carbon fiber manufacturers in China have issued announcements concerning the expansion of carbon fiber production. On December 8, Jilin Chemical Fiber announced that the second carbonization line of the company's 12000 t/a carbon fiber composite project was successfully started. Prior to this, the company's fully self manufactured precursor and 35K large tow production line for high-pressure gas cylinders were also put into operation. Zhongfu Shenying said that with the promotion of Xining project, the company has the market supply capacity of 10000 tons of carbon fiber this year. In October this year, Shanghai Petrochemical announced that the first domestic line of China's first ten thousand ton 48K large tow carbon fiber project was put into operation in the enterprise's carbon fiber industry base, and qualified products were produced. The product performance was comparable to that of the same level products in the United States and the quality reached the international advanced level.

With the encouragement and support of policies, many regions across the country began to lay out upstream and downstream carbon fiber industry chains. On September 19, Ordos held the signing ceremony for the strategic cooperation of the carbon fiber full industry chain production base project to promote the implementation of the 10000 t/a high-performance carbon fiber project. The downstream layout of the carbon fiber industry will include the production base of 100000 hydrogen storage bottles and the production and manufacturing base of 30000 hydrogen fuel heavy trucks, with an annual output value of more than 10 billion yuan.

With the continuous increase of carbon fiber projects in China, the production capacity is constantly improving. China Merchants Securities pointed out that in recent years, driven by downstream demand, China's carbon fiber capacity has expanded rapidly. In 2021, China's carbon fiber operating capacity will reach 63500 tons, with a year-on-year growth of 75.41%, accounting for 30.5% of the global carbon fiber operating capacity. The capacity scale will rank first in the world for the first time.

Further increase in market demand

Under the background of "dual carbon", carbon fiber is widely used in the infrastructure related to new energy projects that are pursued by capital, which is the main reason for the massive expansion of carbon fiber production.

In the direction of hydrogen energy, with the accelerated development of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles, the demand for hydrogen storage bottles will continue to rise, boosting the consumption of carbon fiber. Guosheng Securities pointed out that, based on the average consumption of carbon fiber in hydrogen storage bottles of 60-80 kg, it is estimated that the consumption of carbon fiber in hydrogen fuel cell vehicles will be about 2534 tons in 2022, and the consumption of carbon fiber for this purpose is expected to exceed 10000 tons in 2025.

CEO Carbon Fiber pointed out that from a global perspective, the demand for carbon fiber has increased from 76500 tons in 2016 to 118000 tons in 2021, with a compound annual growth rate of 9.02%. It is estimated that the global demand for carbon fiber will reach 200000 tons in 2025. From the domestic perspective, the demand for carbon fiber will increase from 19600 tons in 2016 to 62400 tons in 2021, with an average annual growth rate of 26.06%. The domestic demand for carbon fiber is expected to be 159300 tons in 2025. CITIC Energy, on the other hand, expects that the total global demand for carbon fiber will reach 260000 tons in 2025, of which the use of wind, light and hydrogen alone is expected to reach 133000 tons, accounting for 51% of the total global demand for carbon fiber in 2025. Wind power is still the first force driving the growth of carbon fiber demand.

In addition, the import substitution policy has also further promoted the development of China's carbon fiber enterprises and raised local concerns about the carbon fiber industry. In 2021, strengthening the R&D and application of carbon fiber and its composites will be included in the key development areas of the "Fourteenth Five Year Plan". In April this year, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the National Development and Reform Commission proposed to overcome the preparation technology of large tow above 48K, high-strength, high modulus and high elongation, T1100 and M65J carbon fibers. At present, after long-term technology accumulation, China's leading carbon fiber enterprises are gradually breaking the foreign technology monopoly, and the capacity scale is expanding. The domestic carbon fiber models have successfully covered T300 to T1100, M35 to M65, achieving benchmarking of major carbon fiber models in Toray, Japan. The tensile strength, tensile modulus, elongation and other performance indicators of some models are even better.

Watch out for low-end overcapacity

The Fourteenth Five Year Plan points out that in addition to promoting technological innovation, the quality of carbon fiber products should also be improved. China Merchants Securities believes that China's domestic carbon fiber is in the opportunity period of import substitution. It is noteworthy that there are still many enterprises in the industry that have not mastered the core production technology of carbon fiber, and there are problems such as poor industrial production stability and high costs. Most of the products are distributed in low value-added fields. Therefore, continuous improvement of production technology level, stable quality and cost reduction is the key to realize the "from having to excellent" of domestic carbon fiber.

Carbon fibers are divided into two categories: large tow and small tow. Relevant people said that the production process of small tow is difficult and the price is high, and it is mainly used in special fields such as military industry, aerospace, etc; Large tow is mainly used in civil industry, and the current capacity expansion is concentrated in large tow. From the feedback of people in the carbon fiber industry, at present, there is no overcapacity problem in domestic carbon fiber industry.

Jilin Chemical Fiber Securities Department said that large tow products require high cost performance, and it is difficult to achieve without core technology. However, some insiders said that with the release of new capacity, the T300 small tow carbon fiber used in the wind power field may face the risk of overcapacity. High end supply is seriously insufficient, low-end capacity is soon overcapacity, and middle end prices are relatively high, which may become a mirror of the carbon fiber industry.