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In the context of the country's realization of the "dual carbon" goal and the construction of a new dual-circulation development pattern, electrification has become one of the important directions for the green development of construction machinery. Mainstream construction machinery companies at home and abroad have increased their investment in equipment electrification and actively launched electrified products. Under the dual factors of policy guidance and market demand, construction machinery giants have begun to "turn around".

Plautus, an ancient Roman comedy writer, said: "Valuable things are meaningful only to those who understand them." This means that the value of a commodity is related to people's needs. An electric loader worth millions may seem expensive to most people, but some people will still buy it because users who understand it will create greater value.

Accelerating layout and accelerating the electrification of construction machinery

In 2020, my country's electric forklift sales reached 410,300 units, an increase of 111,700 units from 2019, accounting for 51.27% of my country's total forklift sales, more than half. Forklifts, which are more sensitive to working conditions, have been at the forefront of electrification.

Since 2009, Caterpillar has followed the trend of electrification and launched the first electric drive equipment for the construction field, the D7E crawler electric drive bulldozer. Later, it applied electric drive to more fields such as mining and developed a variety of electric products to meet the different needs of customers. In 2021, Komatsu of Japan will cooperate with Proterra to produce electric excavators. It is understood that Proterra will provide Komatsu with various components, including batteries and peripheral equipment. If all goes well, the electric excavator will be officially unveiled in 2023-2024. Liugong is an early company to develop electrified products. At present, the electric loaders produced by the company have been well applied in many major projects. In addition, companies such as Sany, XCMG, Zoomlion, and Shandong Lingong have also achieved positive results in product electrification.

In recent years, mainstream engineering machinery companies have launched their own pure electric products. Sany regards electrification as one of the three major strategies for the company's future development. At present, it has launched more than 30 new energy products, covering the three major energy replenishment routes of pure electric, battery replacement, and hydrogen fuel, and has achieved independent development of three major parts such as motors, electric drives, and batteries. It is one of the companies with the "most categories and the most complete technical lines" in the new energy field of the industry. Combining its own characteristics, XCMG is committed to providing users with a full range of electrification solutions. Its products include electric excavators, loaders, mining dump trucks, electric mixer trucks, aerial work platforms, etc., and its services involve battery leasing, maintenance, recycling and other businesses. Zoomlion has released 16 new energy products in 8 series, including the world's first pure electric pump truck, the world's first 60-meter hybrid pump truck, and the world's largest 118-ton off-road pure electric wide-body dump truck. Since 2020, Shandong Lingong's electric loaders have been delivered to major customers such as steel, mines, and ports in batches. In January 2022, the first pure electric micro excavator independently developed by Shanhe Intelligent successfully rolled off the production line. This is a new generation of electric product with high reliability, energy saving and environmental protection developed by Shanhe Intelligent based on its leading innovation platform.

Electric loaders are popular in the market

Judging from the pure electric products released by most construction machinery companies in recent years, most of them are concentrated in the fields of loaders, mixer trucks, mining trucks, etc., which is inseparable from their special application scenarios. In the product structure, excavators, loaders and cranes are the top three products in sales, and the penetration of electrified products has a large demand for lithium batteries.

Lv Ying, deputy secretary general of the China Construction Machinery Industry Association, believes that the electrification of construction machinery is an important part of achieving the goal of low-carbon emission reduction. In some special places, such as long tunnels, narrow indoor spaces, special geographical and climatic environments, and places with high environmental dependence and impact, electric construction machinery will be preferred for construction.

Some experts pointed out that concrete mixer trucks, loaders, slag trucks, excavators, etc. are the products that are easiest to electrify in the future, among which small construction machinery will have a faster propulsion speed.

The road to electrification is not smooth

Although it is a general trend to promote the electrification of construction machinery and accelerate the transformation of construction machinery to intelligence, the current penetration rate of electric construction machinery products in my country is still very low, and the sales volume of electric construction machinery products accounted for only about 1% in 2021. Therefore, in the new track of "carbon neutrality and carbon peak", domestic construction machinery companies are on the same starting line as their international counterparts.

If companies want to accelerate their progress in the tide of carbon emissions and electrification, cost is still the core of their efforts. Taking electric loaders as an example, the price of an electric loader is about 700,000 to 1 million yuan, which is two to three times that of a fuel loader. Although the price of an electric loader is more than 400,000 yuan more expensive than a fuel loader, it can save at least 80 yuan in fuel costs per hour under high-intensity working conditions, which means that the extra purchase cost of an electric loader can be recovered after 5,500 hours of use.

In the survey, almost all users support electrification products and agree that electrification and intelligence are the general trend, but more than 90% of users clearly stated that they will not buy them for the time being. The factor that hinders purchases is still price. In the eyes of some users, the electrification of construction machinery is still in the conceptual stage. Only when the price of the product is equal to its value will they consider buying it.

In electric loaders, the value of the battery accounts for the vast majority of its value. How to overcome the poor safety performance of the battery, short driving range, long charging time, and imperfect supporting charging facilities will be the core issues that need to be focused on in the future.

The author believes that if construction machinery wants to fully realize electrification or popularize electrification on a large scale, it still needs to overcome at least a few "hurdles":

First, the battery life is generally short. There are two main types of batteries used in construction machinery at present, one is lithium iron phosphate battery and the other is lithium battery. These two batteries have their own advantages. Lithium iron phosphate batteries are safe and have a long service life, but their energy density is low; lithium batteries are small in size, have a high energy density, and have a shorter service life. Lithium iron phosphate batteries can be charged about 2,000 times under reasonable charging and discharging conditions. Ordinary lithium batteries can be charged and discharged 400-600 times, and even lithium batteries with better performance will not be charged and discharged more than a thousand times. In terms of battery life alone, whether it is lithium iron phosphate batteries or lithium batteries, there is a big gap compared with traditional diesel engines.

Second, the scope of application is small. If the standard working hours are 8 hours a day, even if the battery is charged only once a day, the service life of lithium batteries will not exceed 3 years, and the service life of lithium iron phosphate batteries will not exceed 5 years. For many users, the normal working time is generally 12 hours or more. Too frequent charging will not only shorten the battery life, but the time required for each charging will also discourage many bosses.

In addition to charging time and battery life, charging piles are also a big problem. In some remote areas, it is inconvenient to use electricity, and when the machine is moved to another place, it is necessary to build another charging pile. Compared with traditional diesel engines, the use of electric machinery is subject to many restrictions. Therefore, only quarries, mixing plants, iron and steel plants and other working conditions with stable power supply are more suitable for the use of electric machinery.

Third, the capacitance decays quickly. After a period of use, the battery will have more or less power decay. Whether it is a lithium iron phosphate battery or a lithium battery, false labels will appear after long-term use. In layman's terms, as the number of charge and discharge times increases, the health of the battery will continue to decline, and the battery will become less and less durable. In addition, whether it is a lithium iron phosphate battery or a lithium battery, the power consumption will accelerate in a low temperature environment, which may affect some northern customers with cold winter climates to choose to use electric construction machinery.

Under the conditions of policy guidance and working conditions, the development path of electrification of construction machinery in my country has become increasingly clear. Although electrification products are the general trend, just like fuel vehicles and electric vehicles, will the development of each other be iterative or long-term coexistence? In this regard, Lv Ying, deputy secretary-general of the China Construction Machinery Industry Association, believes that new energy includes hydrogen fuel, natural gas, etc., and electricity is only one of them. Even if new energy emerges, it will not replace traditional fuels at least in the short term. He said that electrification is progressing, and internal combustion engines are also progressing. As long as it meets environmental protection requirements, users will choose and use it. Therefore, at this stage, the situation of coexistence of various energy sources will exist for a long time. In order for construction machinery to achieve the dual carbon goal, electrification is only one of the directions. In order to meet the needs of users, it is necessary to provide a variety of energy supporting solutions. In his opinion, as long as it meets the national environmental protection needs, it has value and room for development. But he also admitted that electricity, as a clean energy that the country focuses on developing, has advantages in cost and economy. It will definitely be able to develop rapidly in the future, and its proportion will also increase.

Source: China Road Machinery Network