Batteries will be key to Japan becoming carbon neutral by 2050. They are the most important technology for electrifying cars and other mobile devices and are crucial to adjusting electricity supply and demand, which in turn helps boost the use of renewable energy.
At the end of April, Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry revealed that Japan plans to formulate a national battery strategy this summer, including specific government support measures, plans to increase the global production capacity of Japanese battery companies by nearly 10 times to 600GWh, its goal is to occupy 20% of the global rechargeable battery market by 2030.
"We will step up our support to help The Japanese battery industry regain global market share, which we lost to Chinese and South Korean rivals in the past few years," said Nobutaka Takeo, head of the ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry.
Japan's sense of urgency
Japan's global market share of lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles fell to 21 percent in 2020 from 40 percent in 2015, and its share of batteries used in energy storage systems fell to 5 percent in 2020 from 27 percent in 2016, metI said.
Although there is no figure for Japan's overall market share in rechargeable batteries, the change in global power battery installations in the past two years also shows the urgency of Japanese companies and the government for the development of related industries.
In 2020, panasonic became the only Japanese battery company in the world's TOP10 power battery installations, ranking third with a market share of 20.2%, followed by ningde times and LG new energy.
In 2021, its market share fell to 18.4%, still ranking third. In January-February 2022, Panasonic slipped to fourth place after being overtaken by BYD with 10.8% market share.
As a result, the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry's battery strategy expert panel has proposed a goal to increase domestic capacity of batteries used in electric vehicles and energy storage systems from about 20GWh now to 150GWh by 2030, while expanding the global output capacity of Japanese battery makers to 600GWh from the current 60-70GWh.