On December 19, the 2022 Carbon Neutrality Forum of the 17th 21st Century Annual Finance Summit of Asia, organized by the 21st Century Business Herald and the 21st Century Economic Institute, was held under the theme of “From ‘Carbon Peaking and Carbon Neutrality’ Goals to Their Implementation: How to Discover New Value and New Opportunities”. In addition to receiving the title of “Chief Climate Officer”, NaaS Founder and CEO Wang Yang delivered a keynote speech entitled “Digitalization-driven Green Energy: Building a Good Vision of Green Charging” at the forum.
China is one of the largest energy consumers in the world, with the trafficsector contributing to more than 20% of the total energy consumption and taking up more than 90% of Fossil fuels energy consumption, said Wang Yang. This means that the energy transition in society as a whole depends on the energy transformation in the traffic sector.
As China’s new energy vehicle (NEV) industry has flourished in recent years, the vehicle fuel structure is shifting from primarily oil-based to both oil and electricity based. According to the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers, the number of NEVs produced and sold in China was 6.253 million and 6.067 million respectively in the first 11 months of this year, both doubling year on year, with a market share of 25%. In the first three quarters of the year, the number of NEVs sold globally exceeded 7.26 million, with more than 60% sold in China.
The development of the NEV industry has also led to a boom in the charger industry. According to the China Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure Promotion Alliance (EVCIPA), as of November, units within the EVCIPA reported a total of 1.731 million public chargers, indicating a monthly average increase of about 53,000 new ones from December 2021 to November 2022; as of November, charging infrastructure totaled 4.949 million nationwide, an increase of 107.5% year on year.
According to the Industrial Securities research team, with the upgrading of traditional chargers and the increase in demand for electric vehicles (EVs), the demand for new chargers in China is expected to exceed 7.02 million by 2025, and the market space for chargers is expected to exceed RMB 140 billion.
However, China’s charger market is quite “fragmented”. According to the latest data published by the EVCIPA, as of November 2022, 15 operators including TELD, Star Charge, State Grid, and YKC,owned over 10,000 chargers which collectively operated 93.6% of the country’s public chargers.
Wang Yang said, NaaS would like to become a connector for the whole industry, connecting the upstream and downstream of the industry to increase the operating efficiency of the industry.
NaaS is one of largest and fastest-growing EV charging service providers in China, with its operations covering 358 cities. The company has connected more than 44,000 charging stations and covers 404,000 chargers, accounting for one-fourth of all China’s public chargers.
Through its asset-light operation model, NaaS has partnered with 90% of the charger operators in China. For companies that are interested in joining the charger industry, NaaS can also provide one-stop services ranging from site selection, consultation to EPC, operation and station management. The company is also promoting carbon emissions reduction by providing chargers with clean energy such as wind power, PV and hydropower, installing PV equipment for charging stations and creating carbon accounts for individual users.
Wang Yang said, carbon emissions from the traffic sector in China account for 10.4% of the nation’s total. Together with all of its partners, NaaS hopes to increase transport energy efficiency by 10%, which in turn will lead to a 1% reduction in China’s carbon emissions.
