Hydrogen energy is being recognized by the industry as an "energy source" with its own advantages such as cleanliness, zero emissions, and high heat. In the past few years, there has been a boom in hydrogen energy in China, and dozens of local governments have issued plans to support the development of the hydrogen energy industry. Facing the "14th Five-Year Plan", what kind of development trend will the hydrogen energy industry usher in in the next five years? What are the factors restricting the development of the hydrogen energy industry? The development of the industry makes the following five basic judgments.

(1) The hydrogen energy industry is in a stage of development, and the "14th Five-Year Plan" will usher in new development opportunities

In recent years, the hydrogen energy industry has ushered in major development opportunities in China, mainly due to two reasons. First, compared with more than ten years ago, the cost of hydrogen production has dropped significantly, especially the purification of chemical by-product hydrogen. The advancement of technology has provided a large-scale material basis for the development of the hydrogen energy industry. Second, the rapid progress of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles in Japan, South Korea and other countries has allowed the industry to see the huge development space of hydrogen energy in the field of transportation. Under the background of low-carbon development and energy transformation, the hydrogen energy industry has achieved a bottom-up development trend in China, that is, the industry, local governments and the secondary market are very motivated, which is also driving the rapid development of the hydrogen energy industry. biggest factor. In particular, the active intervention of the local government has further established the competition pattern of the industry in the regional layout. However, with the current development of hydrogen energy, there are still major constraints on local governments. On the one hand, some local governments are blindly deploying the hydrogen energy industry and have insufficient understanding of hydrogen energy, which may lead to certain security risks in the future. On the other hand, hydrogen energy requires a large amount of financial subsidies from local governments in the short and medium term. Under the influence of the epidemic, the financial revenue of local governments has dropped sharply, especially in some provinces with poor economies, which are not suitable for large-scale development of the hydrogen energy industry in the short term.

(2) The application of hydrogen energy in the transportation field will usher in a rapid growth rate in the next 5-10 years, but there are still many constraints on the explosive growth

A huge driving force for the new round of hydrogen energy is the application of hydrogen energy in the transportation field, especially the performance of Japan and South Korea in the passenger car market, which has opened up the imagination of the hydrogen energy vehicle industry. space. At present, automakers dominated by Japan's Toyota and Honda, and South Korea's Hyundai and other car companies have already mass-produced passenger cars, especially Toyota Motor, whose mirai fuel cell vehicle market sales total exceeded 10,000 units, and the second-generation mirai is being Introduced to the market, and its production capacity is planned to be expanded 10 times within two years, which has aroused strong market attention. In the next 5-10 years, fuel cell vehicles will show a rapid growth trend worldwide. The United States, Japan, China, Europe and other regions will be the key areas for hydrogen fuel cell vehicles. China is currently dominated by commercial vehicles, which are mainly used in logistics, public transportation and buses. With the support of local policies, it is expected to achieve rapid development. However, whether hydrogen vehicles can achieve explosive growth, there are still several constraints that need to be overcome:

One is the rate of decline in the cost of hydrogen. At present, in Beijing and surrounding markets, the terminal hydrogen market price is 70 yuan/kg, and the price in the Yangtze River Delta and Pearl River Delta regions is 80-120 yuan/kg. Taking Beijing regional buses as an example, the hydrogen energy consumption per 100 kilometers is 8 kilograms, that is, 560 yuan per 100 kilometers, which is seriously insufficient compared with gasoline and diesel vehicles.

The second is whether the subsidy policy can be continued. At present, hydrogen fuel cell vehicles have relatively high financial subsidies. For general buses, with a journey of 20,000 kilometers, the subsidy is about 1 million yuan. In the process of hydrogen energy refueling, the government subsidizes about 30 yuan per kilogram of hydrogen in Beijing and surrounding areas. Whether the above subsidies can continue in the future will be directly related to the popularity and application of hydrogen energy vehicles.

(3) Hydrogen refueling stations will be built on a large scale during the "14th Five-Year Plan" period, and state-owned capital will be the main force for investing in hydrogen refueling stations

The most important link in the development of hydrogen energy vehicles is whether the layout of hydrogen refueling stations and related infrastructure can be quickly started. As of the end of 2019, there are more than 50 hydrogen refueling stations in China, more than 10 are under construction, and dozens of hydrogen refueling stations are planned, with huge space for future development. If the policy support for hydrogen energy does not decline, the number of hydrogen refueling stations in China may exceed 150 by the end of the "14th Five-Year Plan". and joint ventures. The current investment cost of a 35MP hydrogen refueling station is between 18 million and 25 million yuan, and the government subsidy ranges from 3 million to 5 million yuan. According to the current hydrogen price, about 400 hydrogen fuel vehicles can be refilled every day to achieve breakeven. However, judging from the current vehicle situation, almost all of the hydrogen refueling stations in operation in China are in a state of loss.

It is worth mentioning that the oil and hydrogen mixing stations built by traditional oil and gas sales companies such as Sinopec and PetroChina will greatly reduce the operating costs of hydrogen refueling stations. At present, in order to encourage investment in hydrogen refueling stations, some regions adopt the model of bundling hydrogen refueling stations and gas stations, that is, if an enterprise invests in a hydrogen refueling station in the area, it can obtain approval for a gas station, and then use the profits of the gas station to subsidize the operation of the hydrogen refueling station. .

(4) In the fuel cell vehicle industry chain, the proportion of localization of main components such as stacks will increase significantly in the next 5-10 years, and the price of fuel cell vehicles will continue to decline. The current cost of fuel cell vehicles is high, and a fuel cell bus The price of the fuel cell is 2-3 times that of the same type of gasoline car. The main reason for the high price is that the fuel cell and its core components, the stack, are expensive and mainly rely on foreign technology.

At present, more than 80% of the stacks in my country use foreign technologies. The main producers, Guohong Hydrogen Energy and Weichai Power, come from Ballard of Canada. The stack technology independently developed in China is gradually being improved and matured. The rate of change will drop significantly.

The autonomous technology represented by tomorrow's hydrogen energy is currently in operation. The technology comes from the Dalian Institute of Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences and Tongji University. It is considered to be the representative of the autonomous stack. With the further maturity and improvement of the technology, the cost of fuel cell vehicles is expected to be Get further down. On the other hand, the current shipments of fuel cells in China are still relatively small, but the production capacity of the layout has exceeded the demand by dozens of times.

In 2019, the output of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles in China was only 3,018, and the current overall production capacity of fuel cells in my country has reached 150,000 units per year. Therefore, the fuel cell industry will face fierce market competition in the future, and the price will also increase accordingly. decline.

(5) With the development of the hydrogen energy industry, the application scenarios of hydrogen energy will increase significantly. In the next few years, the application of hydrogen energy in other fields such as natural gas will receive more attention. At present, the application of hydrogen energy in the market is mainly concentrated in transportation. The field is dominated by passenger cars, commercial vehicles and hydrogen-powered ships, but the application scenarios of hydrogen energy are very wide. According to relevant experts, the mixed combustion of hydrogen energy and natural gas will have a large market space in the future. Natural gas has always been considered a clean energy source, but recent studies have found that the combustion of natural gas brings huge nitrogen oxide pollution, which has become one of the main sources of air pollutants and climate warming. The hydrogenation and combustion of natural gas can greatly reduce the emission of nitrogen oxides. For example, adding 20% hydrogen to CNG vehicles can reduce the emission of nitrogen oxides by 4 times, while adding less than 5% hydrogen to the natural gas pipeline, It also significantly reduces nitrogen oxide emissions during combustion. In the medium and long term (2050), due to the general trend of energy transformation and the unique advantages of hydrogen energy, the hydrogen energy industry will continue to be optimistic, but whether it can achieve rapid development in the near future mainly depends on two factors, one is whether the policy subsidies will continue, Or whether subsidies will be further increased, and the second is the speed at which the cost of the industrial chain is falling.