BritishPetroleum teams up with Aulton to build battery swap stations

British oil giant BP signed a deal withChina's Aulton New Energy Automotive Technology in November to provide batteryswapping services in Guangzhou, Guangdong province, in the latest step forwardfor the approach to electrification.

Battery swapping involves switching deadbatteries for ones that are fully charged, rather than the more common methodof recharging exhausted batteries at a charging station. And while it isquicker than conventional charging, infrastructure is vastly lacking.

Across China, there are around 160,000battery swap vehicles－mainly used in taxi, logistic and rental sectors－and nearly900 battery swap stations.

According to the deal, Guangzhou Aultonwill become a joint venture of both companies providing battery swap servicesfor taxis, ride-hailing vehicles and other passenger vehicles in Guangzhou.

By the end of 2020, there were 555 batteryswapping locations in China, of which Aulton operated 286 and Nio operated 175,according to the statistics of research firm AskCI Consulting.

Despite the market dominance of thecharging via a station approach, Aulton said it has developed more than 20electric vehicle models compatible with the company's battery-swapping networkwith 14 major automakers, including BAIC Group, FAW Group, Dongfeng Motor,Changan Automobile, SAIC Motor and GAC Group.

Aulton said it plans to complete theconstruction of 10,000 swapping stations that could serve more than 10 millionelectric vehicles by 2025.

The BP-Aulton deal comes on the back of arecent announcement by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. Ithas put forward 11 cities in China to run a pilot program and speed up theconstruction of battery swapping infrastructure.

The program is expected to promote thecreation of more than 100,000 battery swapping vehicles and more than 1,000battery swapping stations within two years in the selected cities.

Of them, the eight major municipalities andcities are Beijing; Nanjing in Jiangsu province; Wuhan in Hubei province; Sanyain Hainan province; Chongqing; Changchun in Jilin province; Hefei in Anhuiprovince; and Jinan in Shandong province, which will accommodate stations forboth passenger and commercial vehicles.

Three other cities－Yibin inSichuan province, Tangshan in Hebei province and Baotou in the Inner Mongoliaautonomous region－that are regional industrial hubs are required to construct batteryswapping stations for electric heavy-duty trucks.

With further government support, FounderSecurities forecast that there will be more than 3 million battery swap carswith more than 28,000 supporting facilities by 2025.

"As the pilot started, the industrywill usher in rapid development and a considerable rise in battery swappingvehicles," said Liu Kai, director of the technology and certificationdepartment of China Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure PromotionAlliance.

Electric vehicle startup Nio, as arepresentative carmaker of battery swapping, has three models that can swapbatteries or charge up.

An executive in charge of battery swappingat Nio said the technology has several advantages. They include that it onlytakes three minutes, which is faster than charging, it is safer and offerslonger battery life.

To date, Nio has 609 battery swappingstations and plans to install more than 700 by the end of this year and add 600annually between 2022-25 in China.

However, battery swapping faces a raft ofobstacles, including a lack of common technical standards and operationsmanagement.

Battery positioning and sizes betweencarmakers vary widely, making compatibility hard, Liu said.

The large investment needed to constructbattery swapping stations and their low utilization make it harder forcarmakers to join in, he added.

The executive at Nio said the carmaker hashelped in the formulation and revision of 21 battery swapping standards. Itwill take the lead in formulating standards for electricity metering andbilling next year, in efforts to meet the swapping demands of more privatepassenger cars.

BPsigns long-term deal with Shenzhen Gas

BP signed a gas sales and purchaseagreement with Shenzhen Sino-Benny LPG Co Ltd on Oct. 25, the first long-termdeal with price indexed to international LNG in China's domestic gas market, tosupport China's growing energy needs.

Under the terms of the agreement, startingfrom 2023, BP will provide Sino-Benny, a wholly-owned subsidiary of ShenzhenGas Group Co Ltd, with up to 300,000 tons of pipeline gas per year in Shenzhen.

"We look forward to working closelywith Shenzhen Gas to provide high-quality delivery in support of China'sgrowing energy needs," said Federica Berra, senior vice-president of BP IntegratedGas and Power, said.

"This demonstrates BP as an integratedenergy company as we supply, re-gasify and access new customer markets."

The gas will be supplied through the LNGreceiving terminal of Guangdong Dapeng LNG Company Limited where BP holdsregasification capacity, said the company.

"Energy security is a global andstrategic issue closely related to economic and social development," saidZhen Li, chairman of Shenzhen Gas.

"The current state of global anddomestic energy is undergoing profound changes, and it is of strategicimportance for Shenzhen Gas and BP China to once again join hands against abackground of China's carbon peak and carbon neutrality commitments."

According to BP's 2021 Statistical Reviewof World Energy, the share of gas in primary energy continued to rise, reachinga record high of 24.7 percent. Natural gas has also an important role to playin aiding to accelerate transition to a lower-carbon energy system.

Based on scenarios in BP's 2020 EnergyOutlook, the global demand for gas grows relatively robustly over the next 15years or so, driven primarily by China, India, and other developing Asiacountries as they switch away from coal toward lower carbon fuels, it said.

BP,DiDi charging stations will charge carbon neutrally

BP China and DiDi had early announced thatall customers using the bp-xiaoju network of electric vehicle charging sitesacross China will charge carbon neutrally.

This is China's first carbon neutral EVcharging offer and is based on international and national standards for carbonneutrality. BP China said bp-xiaoju, an EV charging joint venture between BPand DiDi, aims to develop a fast-charging network in key regions in southern,eastern, northern, southwestern and central parts of China.

Simon Yang, BP China president, said thecompany is excited to offer integrated and decarbonized energy solutions inChina.

With our diversified business activitieshere, we plan to continue to provide more carbon neutral products and servicesto China's retail customers, industrial partners and cities, in support of alower carbon energy future, Yang said.

While EVs do not generate direct tailpipecarbon emissions, the power provided through the grid comes from a range ofsources, including fossil fuels. The new offer enables customers in Chinacharging EVs at any bp-xiaoju EV site to have the lifecycle carbon emissionsfrom the power purchased offset, said BP China.

The attempt comes against the backdrop thatChina announced its ambition to peak carbon dioxide emissions before 2030 andto become carbon neutral by 2060.

"China is leading the world in theevolution of transport and electrification of mobility. Working closely withDiDi, we intend to help meet China's rapidly rising demand for charging andalso support its aim of reducing carbon emissions," said Richard Bartlett,BP senior vice-president of future mobility & solutions.

"We are excited to help our growingnumber of bp-xiaoju customers across China with this first carbon neutralcharging offer."

Xie Jingjing, general manager of XiaojuEnergy, DiDi's energy business arm, said the company is striving to build anetwork of quality EV charging stations and promote the further development ofEVs.

We'll continue to work with BP, industrialshareholders and local communities to provide more innovative carbon neutralinitiatives and fulfill our own sustainability commitment, she said.

BPcalls on EU not to discard natural gas

The British multinational oil and gascompany BP has urged the European Union not to close the door on natural gasfor power generation.

The plea was the latest development in arow brewing within the bloc about the future of natural gas. Some lobbyistsclaim it should be phased out because of its contribution to greenhouse gasesand others say it should be tolerated because it is less damaging than coal.

Reuters reported that BP had called on theEU to support natural gas because, despite it being a fossil fuel, it ishelping in the transition to a low-carbon world and will help the bloc hit itstarget of net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

The lobbying followed the bloc outliningits plan to exclude natural-gas power plants from its list of sustainableprojects

The bloc has since held back on making adecision about how to categorize the power plants while it seeks more advice.

Reuters said BP had complained natural-gasprojects would struggle for funding if they were not deemed sustainable, andthat would make it more likely that nations would simply stick with pollutingcoal-fired power plants.

BP said natural-gas power plants emitroughly half the carbon dioxide produced by coal-fired plants.

BP insisted it still supports the EU'sclimate goals but some investors were puzzled by its lobbying on behalf ofnatural gas, which seemed to be at odds with the company's aim of supportingnet-zero carbon policies and bringing its own carbon emissions down to net-zeroby 2050.

Natasha Landell-Mills, from institutionalinvestor and asset management company Sarasin and Partners, told Reuters thatBP's lobbying raised serious questions.

"If their (capital expenditure) wasoriented toward full decarbonization by 2050, then you'd naturally expect tosee lobbying align with this goal. The fact it seems to be pushing the otherway suggests a problem," she said.

Other energy companies, including Total andRepsol, have also lobbied recently on behalf of natural gas.

And Reuters said at least nine EU countrieshave lobbied the EU to call natural-gas power plants sustainable; these includethe Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland.

But other EU nations have insisted that thebloc stands firm and refuses to label natural-gas power plants sustainable;these include Denmark, Spain, and Ireland.

The online news site and industry hubGasworld once published an interview with Louise Jacobsen Plutt, BP's seniorvice-president of hydrogen, carbon capture usage and storage, in which she saidbecoming a net-zero company by 2050, or sooner, "will no doubt bechallenging".