Ant Group leads the investment as Beijing's specialized and sophisticated "little giant" enterprise "China Ocean Energy Storage" completes over 100 million yuan in Pre - A++ round financing | Exclusive by 36Kr
Text | Zhang Bingbing
Editor | A Zhi
36Kr learned that Zhonghai Energy Storage Technology (Beijing) Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Zhonghai Energy Storage") recently announced the completion of a Pre - A++ round of financing exceeding 100 million yuan. This financing was led by Ant Group, followed by Junheng Investment and Beijing Changping Small and Medium - sized Enterprise Growth Investment Fund. The funds will be mainly used for technology R & D and production capacity expansion. The historical investors of "Zhonghai Energy Storage" are Sequoia Capital China, Source Code Capital, Qingliu Capital, and Matrix Partners China.
"Zhonghai Energy Storage" was established in 2020, targeting the large - scale long - term energy storage field and focusing on the R & D and application of iron - chromium flow battery technology. Its independently developed iron - chromium flow battery technology has solved the problem of absorbing large - scale renewable energy grid connection. The product has been included in the list of the first (set) major technical equipment in the national energy field and has won the titles of "National High - tech Enterprise" and "Beijing Specialized, Sophisticated, Distinctive, and Innovative Enterprise".
Recently, "Zhonghai Energy Storage" announced winning the bid for the 50MW/300MWh independent new - type energy storage power station project in Huiyang District, with a total project investment of nearly one billion yuan. At present, "Zhonghai Energy Storage" has formed a national industrial layout centered on its Beijing headquarters, with an annual production capacity of 1GWh, and plans to build industrial bases in multiple locations.
The energy storage power station project of "Zhonghai Energy Storage" in Huiyang District
I. An interdisciplinary R & D team independently breaks through the bottleneck of flow battery technology
Against the background of the accelerated development of the new power system, the scale of wind power and photovoltaic power generation continues to expand. Restricted by meteorological conditions, this type of new - energy power generation has intermittent characteristics, and direct grid connection will pose challenges to the stability of the power grid. Therefore, it is necessary to build long - term energy storage power stations in the power plants, and realize power time - shifting through the "storage - release" mechanism.
Based on its special structure and working principle, the flow battery is regarded as one of the most suitable battery technologies for long - term energy storage. Among them, the iron - chromium flow battery shows potential in terms of safety, environmental protection, cycle life, and energy conversion efficiency. However, problems such as hydrogen evolution, low activity, and high cost once restricted its commercial development.
"The flow battery contains both the 'three transfers and one reaction' in the traditional chemical engineering field and introduces an electric field. It is a very complex coupling system. Relying solely on the adjustment of a certain material or a certain technology, it is difficult to truly solve problems such as hydrogen evolution and reaction activity." Wang Shan, the CEO of "Zhonghai Energy Storage", introduced that through years of R & D, "Zhonghai Energy Storage" combined the coupling application of new materials, new processes, and structures to finally solve the above problems.
For example, the electrode and the bipolar plate are two core materials of the flow battery. The interior of the traditional carbon - based electrode is a 3D space similar to a sponge, which undertakes both the electrochemical reaction process and the electrolyte flow channel. During the flow process, local turbulence and circulation will occur, resulting in a large amount of hydrogen evolution.
In order to fundamentally suppress these side reactions, "Zhonghai Energy Storage" independently developed a carbon cloth electrode, changing the sponge - like electrode several millimeters thick into a cloth less than one millimeter thick. At the same time, it developed and designed a bipolar plate with a flow channel, so that the carbon cloth electrode only undertakes the electrochemical reaction, and the function of the traditional electrolyte flow channel is transferred to the flow channel of the bipolar plate, thus controlling the flow rate, flow volume, direction, and flow trajectory of the electrolyte, improving the reaction efficiency and suppressing hydrogen evolution.
The simulation diagram of the products of "Zhonghai Energy Storage"
At present, the interdisciplinary R & D team of "Zhonghai Energy Storage" has top - notch talents in fields such as electrochemistry, control, and electrical engineering. In 2022, "Zhonghai Energy Storage" began to develop a vertical large - model in the field of flow batteries and has now launched a dedicated large - model for flow batteries with the ability of reasoning thinking chains.
"At this stage, from the perspectives of process, materials, and structure, and from the perspective of marketization, 'Zhonghai Energy Storage' has broken through the industry's technical bottleneck." Wang Shan introduced that the R & D focus and long - term goal of "Zhonghai Energy Storage" in 2025 is to continuously reduce the cost per kilowatt - hour of the product's entire life cycle.
II. Targeting independent energy storage power stations on the grid side and lowering the price of iron - chromium flow batteries
The cost accounting of energy storage products generally has two dimensions: The first dimension is the initial investment cost that customers are more concerned about, that is, the investment in purchasing energy storage equipment when initially building an energy storage power station. The second dimension is the annual operation and maintenance cost generated during the entire life cycle of the energy storage power station. Especially for grid - side and power - source - side energy storage power stations with a service life of more than 20 years, the total investment over the entire cycle needs to be comprehensively accounted for.
Wang Shan introduced that currently, lithium iron phosphate batteries with a high market share have an advantage in the initial installation cost. For energy storage equipment with a 4 - hour storage duration, lithium batteries can reach 0.6 - 0.7 yuan/Wh. However, the capacity of lithium iron phosphate batteries decays during use. After decaying to a certain extent, new cells need to be replaced, and multiple cell replacements during the entire life cycle will lead to a significant increase in operating costs and the cost of the entire life cycle.
The initial installation cost of flow batteries is slightly higher than that of lithium batteries, but all main equipment has a lifespan of 20 - 30 years, and there is no need to replace the main equipment. The annual operation and maintenance cost is very low. Overall, the component cost and total investment are more advantageous. And as the energy storage duration increases, the cost advantage increases exponentially.
Different technical routes correspond to different application markets. Wang Shan believes that lithium iron phosphate batteries are more suitable for industrial and commercial energy storage. Under the requirements of the scale and return cycle of industrial and commercial energy storage, lithium batteries with a lower initial cost are a better choice. For energy storage power stations on the power - source side and grid side, the service life starts at 20 years. When calculating the cost of the entire life cycle, the disadvantage of the high initial cost will be offset, and the advantages of flow batteries such as long - term energy storage, safety, and scalability will be prominent. The two complement each other in the energy transformation and jointly support the construction of the new power system.
Therefore, "Zhonghai Energy Storage" targeted independent energy storage power stations on the grid side and the integration of source, grid, load, and storage from the beginning. "We judge that in the next few years, a large number of independent energy storage power stations and source - grid - load - storage integration projects and demands will emerge in the Chinese market." Wang Shan believes that behind the demand are the driving forces of three major trends: the continuous increase in the installed power generation capacity of new energy, the expansion of the electricity price difference in the electricity spot market, and the increasing demand for auxiliary services such as frequency regulation and peak shaving on the grid side.
In market competition, what products always need to do is to achieve the lowest cost per kilowatt - hour of the entire life cycle on the premise of pursuing essential safety.
In response, "Zhonghai Energy Storage" started with the two core elements that determine the product price: raw materials and comprehensive design. At the raw material end, it has achieved 100% domestic substitution in the entire system and continuously reduces the cost of raw materials through newly developed formulas and new production processes. Taking the electrolyte as an example, the cost per kilowatt - hour of "Zhonghai Energy Storage" has dropped to half of that in 2020.
In terms of design, the overall system module structure has been optimized. Traditional flow batteries install power modules and even electrolyte tanks in containers, resulting in a relatively high proportion of container design in the cost. For station - type applications, "Zhonghai Energy Storage" cancelled the container structure and saved costs through other heat - preservation methods. At the same time, for this station - type system, a waste heat recovery system was fully introduced, increasing the owner's revenue by about 5% - 10%.
III. Welcoming the "Year of Good Development" for energy storage, and the contract value of projects within this year is expected to exceed one billion yuan
In February this year, the National Development and Reform Commission and the National Energy Administration issued the "Notice on Deepening the Market - Oriented Reform of New - Energy Grid - Connected Electricity Prices and Promoting the High - Quality Development of New Energy". For the energy storage industry, the most important point is to stop the "mandatory energy storage allocation policy".
The "mandatory energy storage allocation policy" was once an important driving force for the development of the energy storage market and spurred the rapid growth of the Chinese energy storage market for a period of time, laying the foundation for the construction of new energy. However, it also led owners to regard energy storage as a cost when investing in energy storage, and there were even phenomena such as building but not using and low - price involution later. Some experts analyzed that the core of canceling the "mandatory energy storage allocation policy" is to solve the pain point of insufficient flexibility in the power system through a market - oriented mechanism and promote the transformation of the energy storage industry from "mandatory allocation" to "allocation on demand".
"We believe that after the introduction of this policy in 2025, owners will truly take the initiative to think about which energy storage technology route to choose, and after completion, they will think about how to operate, how to obtain revenue, and ultimately truly generate various transactions and revenues. In this way, energy storage will truly enter a complete economic closed - loop." Based on this, Wang Shan judged that for enterprises deeply involved in R & D and technical routes, the year of energy storage development will truly begin, and they will have opportunities for good development.
Starting from 2025, "Zhonghai Energy Storage" has officially entered the full - scale industrialization stage and began to undertake large - scale projects on the grid side and user side. Wang Shan expects that the contract value in 2025 can reach billions of yuan, and it is expected to double in 2026.
With the continuous increase in AI computing power, AI data centers consume a huge amount of energy and require long - term stable power support. Long - term energy storage technology, especially flow batteries, has become the key to solving this problem. The long cycle life, high safety, and strong scalability of flow batteries allow them to be flexibly configured according to the specific needs of AI data centers. In addition, the cycle times of flow batteries can reach more than 20,000 times, and the calendar cycle life is up to 20 years, which can match the long - term operation needs of data centers.
The Huailai Cloud Data Center project of "Zhonghai Energy Storage"
Facing the rapidly increasing delivery demand, Wang Shan believes that the difficulties lie in the precision control of product batch production and the supporting capabilities of upstream suppliers. In terms of precision control, since 2022, the China Academy of Machinery Science and Technology has participated in the product design and new material development of "Zhonghai Energy Storage" throughout the process, customizing a fully digital intelligent factory, truly realizing the measurability and controllability of the entire process from single batteries, battery stacks to the overall system module, ensuring that the assembly precision and consistency of products can reach a very high level at the time of leaving the factory.
In terms of the supporting capabilities of upstream suppliers, "Zhonghai Energy Storage" requires that at least 3 - 5 qualified suppliers be ensured for a single material, and each qualified supplier must go through a strict process of factory inspection, small - scale test, medium - scale test, and scale - up. For the large - scale project that has been signed in Huiyang District, it requires that at important nodes in the production process of all major suppliers and the inspection link before the product leaves the factory, construction engineers participate in and control every link throughout the process.
At the same time, "Zhonghai Energy Storage" will improve the "1 + 4+N" industrial layout and accelerate the construction of industrial bases in Huizhou City, Guangdong Province, Lankao County, Kaifeng City, Henan Province, Jungar Banner, Ordos City, Inner Mongolia, etc. It is expected that the first - phase construction of the industrial bases will be completed within this year, achieving an overall production capacity of more than 2GWh.
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This article is from the WeChat public account "36Kr Future Industries". The authors are Zhang Bingbing and A Zhi. 36Kr was authorized to publish it.