Type III and IV hydrogen storage bottles have become the mainstream in the market, and the demand for carbon fiber for hydrogen storage bottles is growing rapidly.

Hydrogen energy is a type of green, low-carbon renewable energy with a wide range of sources. It has been widely used in transportation, energy storage, automobiles, electric power, industry, petroleum, chemical industry, electronics, metallurgy and other fields. Currently, driven by the rapid development of hydrogen energy application fields such as hydrogen fuel cells, electric vehicles, and hydrogen power generation, the demand for hydrogen energy storage and transportation is growing. Compared with other storage and transportation methods such as liquid hydrogen storage and solid hydrogen storage, high-pressure gas storage and transportation has become the first choice for hydrogen energy storage and transportation due to its low storage and transportation costs, fast hydrogen charging and discharging speed, simple equipment structure, and wide temperature adaptability range. Mainstream way. As a key equipment carrier for high-pressure gaseous hydrogen storage, hydrogen storage bottles continue to unleash market demand.

High-pressure gaseous hydrogen storage bottles mainly include four categories, namely pure steel metal bottles (Type I), steel-lined fiber-wound bottles (Type II), aluminum-lined fiber-wound bottles (Type III), and plastic-lined fiber-wound bottles. Bottle (Type IV). Type III and Type IV hydrogen storage bottles are currently the mainstream in the domestic high-pressure gaseous hydrogen storage bottle market. Except for the different inner tank materials, the bottle body uses a carbon fiber full winding process, and the carbon fiber material accounts for nearly 60%. Among them, type III hydrogen storage bottles have been widely used in the field of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles at home and abroad; type IV hydrogen storage bottles have achieved large-scale mass production in Japan, South Korea, the United States, Norway and other countries. However, due to technical limitations, our country has not yet achieved mass production. production capacity.

Carbon fiber is an inorganic fiber with a carbon backbone structure with a carbon content of more than 90%. It has excellent mechanical, heat resistance, chemical stability, etc. It is a key raw material for Type III and Type IV high-pressure gaseous hydrogen storage bottles currently on the market. Currently, driven by the rapid development of the fuel cell vehicle and electric vehicle markets, the market demand for on-board hydrogen storage bottles continues to increase, which in turn drives the expansion of the carbon fiber market for hydrogen storage bottles. According to the “Research Report on Market Monitoring and Future Development Prospects of China’s Carbon Fiber Industry for Hydrogen Storage Bottles from 2023 to 2027” released by the Industrial Research Center It shows that the global market demand for carbon fiber for hydrogen storage bottles has exceeded 15,000 tons in 2022, a year-on-year increase of approximately 21.8%. In the future, as the application fields of hydrogen storage bottles continue to expand, the demand for carbon fiber is expected to continue to rise, and the market development potential is huge.

Carbon fiber is one of the key materials for hydrogen storage bottles. Its quality has an important impact on the stable performance of hydrogen storage bottles. Therefore, carbon fiber for hydrogen storage bottles generally needs to have good safety performance, wear resistance, and dimensional stability. Performance, heat resistance, chemical resistance, permeability, etc., the material technology requirements are relatively high. At present, carbon fiber for hydrogen storage bottles usually adopts T700 grade and above specifications. The technical barriers to products of this specification are relatively high, and the global market is still dominated by leading international companies such as Japan’s Toray and Germany’s SGL.

Industrial analysts personnel said that after continuous breakthroughs in key technologies in recent years, Guangwei Composite Materials, Zhongfu Shenying, and Zhongjian Technology Domestic leading carbon fiber companies such as Hengshen Co., Ltd. and Hengshen Co., Ltd. have gradually achieved mass production capabilities of T700 and T800 carbon fibers and expanded their application areas. However, at present, there is still a big gap between my country’s T700 grade carbon fiber and the products of leading foreign companies in terms of product quality and performance stability. In the future, local companies will need to accelerate the improvement of their technical level and promote the continuous improvement of product quality and performance, and then provide Type IV storage. The localization of hydrogen bottles has laid a good foundation.