China’s electric heavy truck market could account for 50% of total sales by 2028, up from just 10% in 2024, the chairman of Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. Ltd. (CATL) said, according to a report by Shanghai-based outlet Jiemian.
Zeng Yuqun, speaking at the launch of a battery-swapping solution for heavy trucks, said the shift to electrification would continue to pressure fuel demand in the sector, already impacted by the growth of liquefied natural gas (LNG) truck adoption in China.
The remarks come as CATL pushes forward with expanding its battery production footprint. On Saturday, the company announced that a 60 gigawatt-hour energy storage and electric vehicle (EV) battery manufacturing facility had officially started production in Shandong, marking its first such plant in northern China.
According to a post on CATL’s WeChat account, the facility is just the first phase of a larger project. A second and third phase are expected to follow within two years, eventually forming a major battery industry cluster valued in the billions of yuan.
The local government in Shandong has ambitious plans to turn the province into a national lithium battery hub. A previous government notice indicated that Shandong aims to build a 100 billion yuan ($14 billion) battery industry by 2025, covering the full value chain from electrode materials and electrolytes to cell manufacturing and assembly.
