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▲ A view of Hyundai Motor Group’s Yangjae headquarters |
[에너지경제신문 여헌우 기자] The Hyundai Motor Group is expanding its hydrogen fuel cell system business in China, following Korea, Europe, and the United States. It is a paving stone to step closer to the dream of a’hydrogen economy super-gap’, which is becoming a reality, such as succeeding in mass production of hydrogen electric vehicles for the first time in the world.
Hyundai Motor Group announced on the 15th that it has signed an investment contract to establish a hydrogen fuel cell system production and sales subsidiary with the Guangzhou Development Zone government in Guangzhou City, Guangdong Province, China.
The event was attended by Guangdong relations such as Guangdong Provincial Ministry of Commerce Link, Hong Guangdong Vice Mayor Hong, Gwang-guk Lee, President of Hyundai Motor Group’s China Business, and Hyukjun Lee, Vice President of Hyundai Motor Group China Limited Corporation (HMGC).
This investment contract is evaluated as meaningful in that Hyundai Motor Group will establish its first overseas production base for hydrogen fuel cell systems in China, which is promoting’hydrogen excavation’, to solidify its position as a leading company in the hydrogen field.
◇ Hyundai Motor Group will supply 700,000 hydrogen fuel cell systems annually in 2030 globally
The Hyundai Motor Group plans to supply about 700,000 units of hydrogen fuel cell systems to the world annually in 2030, further expanding its global business with the establishment of a production base in China. Prior to this, Hyundai Motor Group signed an eco-friendly powertrain joint development agreement with Cummins of the United States in 2019, starting with a fuel cell technology partnership with Audi in 2018 in the hydrogen fuel cell system business field. Last year, it started exporting to European hydrogen storage technology companies and energy solution startups.
The new subsidiary will be established with a 100% stake in Hyundai Motor Group. Hyundai Motor Group signed an MOU with the government of Guangdong Province in China in connection with the establishment of a corporation in December 2019, and then conducted a pre-market survey to enter the Chinese hydrogen fuel cell system market, and selected a site for the construction of production facilities. And Guangzhou City and Cebu plans have been discussed.
Hyundai Motor Group’s hydrogen fuel cell system production base in China is scheduled to start at the end of February of this year and will produce 6,500 units a year from the second half of 2022. It mainly produces the hydrogen fuel cell system installed in the hydrogen electric vehicle Nexo, and plans to sequentially expand its supply capacity in accordance with the Chinese central government policy and market conditions.
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▲ An image of a hydrogen fuel cell made by Hyundai Motor Group. |
The Hyundai Motor Group is preoccupying the Chinese hydrogen market, which is expected to accelerate growth under the strong leadership of the central government with the world-class hydrogen fuel cell system mass production technology that it has already secured, including eco-friendly vehicles, hydrogen electric vehicles, and commercial hydrogen vehicles. Is the plan.
◇ China’s’Hydrogen Drilling’ promotes the supply of 1 million hydrogen electric vehicles in 2035
In October of last year, the China Automobile Engineering Society, which is an advisory body for automobile-related policies of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, announced the’Energy Saving and Eco-friendly Vehicle Technology Roadmap 2.0′, and by 2035, new energy vehicles (pure electric vehicles, hydrogen electric vehicles, etc.) and energy It proposed a policy that the proportion of sales of reduced vehicles (hybrid cars, fuel-efficient cars, etc.) should be 50% each.
In particular, this roadmap includes a specific goal of supplying up to 1 million hydrogen electric vehicles, mainly commercial vehicles, by 2035, giving a glimpse of the atmosphere of fostering the hydrogen industry in China. Also, from this year to 2025, China’s ’14th Five-Year Economic Development Plan’ is in progress, and China’s expansion of eco-friendly cars is also expected to accelerate.
The Chinese government is actively attracting major foreign companies to develop hydrogen electric vehicle technology and foster the market. Accordingly, global companies are actively moving to preoccupy an early position in the newly opened China’s huge hydrogen market.
Since Toyota built a hydrogen charging station in Jiangsu Province, China in 2017, it has continuously promoted market entry through cooperation with leading companies in China. In June of last year, it established a R&D joint venture in Beijing in partnership with China’s Ewha Tong Hydrogen Fuel Cell System Group, DI Automobile Group, Guangzhou Automobile Group, Beijing Automobile Group, and Dongfeng Automobile Group.
Global companies such as Ballard Power Systems of Canada, Bosch and SFC Energy of Germany, and Ceres Power of the UK are also rapidly entering the hydrogen fuel cell system business in China. In the future, fierce competition for securing technological leadership is expected.
Guangdong Province, where the Hyundai Motor Group’s first overseas hydrogen fuel cell system production base was built, was the first place where China’s reform and opening policy began 40 years ago, and it is the economic center that ranks first in China’s gross domestic product (GDP) rankings.
Guangdong Province is continuously promoting local government policy efforts to foster the hydrogen industry. In November of last year, the company announced a plan to promote the implementation of the hydrogen fuel cell vehicle industry in Guangdong Province, and revealed a specific goal of strengthening the competitiveness of the hydrogen industry by utilizing industrial complexes, R&D facilities and related value chain industrial bases in Guangdong Province.
In addition, it has also announced a pilot operation plan for various hydrogen projects, such as ships, home hydrogen fuel cells, and emergency power systems, centering on commercial logistics vehicles, and has an environment suitable as a bridgehead for Hyundai Motor Group’s entry into the Chinese hydrogen market.
Meanwhile, Hyundai Motor Group is investing a total of 7.6 trillion won to build a broad hydrogen industry ecosystem according to the’FCEV (hydrogen electric vehicle) vision 2030′ announced in Korea in 2018 as planned. In the future, the company will continue to strengthen its world-class technological advantage by expanding the lineup of next-generation hydrogen fuel cell systems such as high-power systems and lightweight high-density systems through new technology development.