Charging pile growth surpasses electric vehicles | Insight Research

The construction of charging piles in China is accelerating rapidly. In February this year, the incremental number of public charging piles in China reached 44,000 units, with a year-on-year growth rate of 51.2%, far exceeding the growth rate of new energy vehicle sales during the same period, which was -9.2%. This has led to the ratio of new energy vehicle charging pile increment in China exceeding 2.5:1 for the first time.

1. The ratio of vehicle to charging pile increment exceeds 2.5:1 for the first time, alleviating range anxiety

The new energy vehicle market in China has long been superior to the United States and Europe in terms of the ratio of vehicles to charging piles. However, despite the continuous high growth of new energy vehicle sales, the ratio of vehicles to charging piles has been difficult to exceed 2.5:1, and the problems of charging difficulty and slow charging still persist.

Data from 2023 shows that although the growth of new energy vehicle sales has slowed down, it is still faster than the expansion speed of charging infrastructure. Specifically, in 2023, new energy vehicle sales reached 9.495 million units, a year-on-year increase of 37.9%, while the charging infrastructure increased by 3.386 million units during the same period, a year-on-year increase of 30%, achieving a vehicle to charging pile increment ratio of 2.8:1.

However, data from the first two months of this year show signs of a reversal in this trend. The increment of charging infrastructure was 427,000 units, while the domestic sales of new energy vehicles reached 1.025 million units, resulting in a vehicle to charging pile increment ratio exceeding 2.5:1 for the first time, reaching 2.4:1.

Although the disruption of the New Year holidays at the beginning of the year led to a slight decrease in new energy vehicle sales, Wall Street News·Jianzhi Research believes that the rapid increase in the growth rate of charging piles this year is the reason for the breakthrough:

Firstly, in the same period of January and February last year, despite the presence of holiday disruption factors, the ratio of new energy vehicle charging pile increment still stopped at above 2.5:1, without a qualitative breakthrough.

Secondly, in February this year, the year-on-year growth rate of the total number of charging infrastructure nationwide reached 51.2%, far exceeding the growth rate of around 30% for the whole of last year.

The composition of public charging stations in China is also undergoing significant changes, with the proportion of fast-charging direct current charging piles increasing, and the growth rate of more efficient battery swapping stations far exceeding that of charging piles. Direct current fast-charging piles (power greater than 60KW) make it more convenient for new energy vehicles to replenish energy, and the development of battery swapping stations has also seen significant growth.

As of February 2024, the total number of public charging piles in China has reached 2.826 million units, with the number of direct current charging piles reaching 1.239 million units and the number of alternating current charging piles reaching 1.586 million units, accounting for 44% of the total. This proportion has increased compared to around 40% last year, indicating that the layout and application of fast-charging piles are accelerating.

The development of battery swapping stations is also progressing rapidly. Thanks to the policy of reducing the purchase tax for new energy vehicles, especially the preferential policies for battery swapping models, the number of battery swapping stations has reached 3,645 as of February this year, with an annual growth rate of over 80%, far exceeding the growth rate of around 30% for charging piles.

Currently, several mainstream new energy vehicle companies, including Changan Automobile and Geely, are joining the development and research of battery swapping stations led by Nio, promoting the expansion of the battery swapping network. Currently, Nio's battery swapping station network has captured over 65% of the market share.

2. The High Growth of Charging Infrastructure Will Continue

Currently, the development potential of charging infrastructure remains significant. From a policy perspective, according to the "Guiding Opinions on the High-Quality Development of Distribution Networks in the New Situation" issued by the National Development and Reform Commission and the National Energy Administration on March 1 this year, by 2025, the distribution network should have the capacity to connect around 500 million kilowatts of distributed new energy and approximately 12 million charging piles.

By the end of 2023, the total number of charging infrastructure nationwide reached 8.596 million units, indicating that the space for new charging piles this year is at least 3.4 million units. If the quantity of charging infrastructure can truly keep up, the issue of charging inconvenience will see significant improvement.

From the demand side, by the end of 2023, the domestic stock of new energy vehicles was about 20 million units, and it is expected to exceed 60 million units by the end of 2025. To alleviate the "charging anxiety" of new energy vehicle owners, assuming a relatively conservative ratio of 2.5:1 for new energy vehicles to charging piles, the total demand for charging stations in 2025 will also exceed 24 million units, which is 2.66 times the current quantity, requiring the addition of nearly 15 million charging piles.

The rapid growth in domestic sales of new energy vehicles in recent years has shown that electric vehicles have indeed been rapidly popularized. However, the issue of charging and replenishing energy for new energy vehicles has always been a difficult pain point, especially during holidays when the problem becomes more severe.

If the imbalance in the ratio of new energy vehicle charging piles continues, it will in turn restrict the further development of domestic new energy vehicles. Therefore, accelerating the construction of charging piles is key to solving this issue. In the future, no queuing for charging and efficient charging and battery swapping will gradually become the norm.