POSCO focusing on EV materials
POSCO's PBC-EV chassis for electric vehicles / Courtesy of POSCO
POSCO Chairman Choi Jeong-woo
Steel giant POSCO and its affiliates are focusing their business capabilities on developing and producing steel and non-steel materials for electric vehicles (EV), in an effort to reinvent themselves as leaders in the EV materials market.
According to POSCO, Monday, it is raising its production capacity for light-weight steel plates and products for EV chassis, frames and motors, while POSCO Chemtech and POSCO ICT are working on battery materials and charging infrastructure, respectively.
This is in line with new POSCO Chairman Choi Jeong-woo's pledge to raise the group's share in the global energy storage materials market to 20 percent by 2030.
Leading POSCO's EV business is its extra-strong Giga Steel, which withstands more than 100 kilograms-force per square millimeter. Since it is regarded as one of the strongest steels available for automobiles, automakers can make thinner chassis and frames, meaning the car will be lighter.
By applying Giga Steel, automakers can reduce chassis weight by up to 30 percent from existing ones of the same size. Currently, various brands, including Toyota, Volkswagen and General Motors are using Giga Steel for their chassis.
Another core EV material is Hyper Non-Oriented (NO) electrical steel. Electrical steel produces magnetic and electrical properties and is categorized into non-oriented and grain oriented (GO) electrical steel. NO steel is widely used for motors and other rotating machines and GO is mostly used for transformers.
EV motors are made by assembling magnets, a motor core and other parts. The motor core is responsible for converting electric energy into rotating energy and is made by piling up NO electrical steel sheets.
POSCO said its Hyper NO steel has the energy loss by 30 percent compared to existing electrical steel products by making the sheets thinner. POSCO raised the yearly capacity of Hyper NO steel to 160,000 tons in 2017, which is enough for motor cores for 2.6 million EVs.
For EV batteries, POSCO has recently announced a plan to build a plant which will be capable of producing 50,000 tons of cathode materials a year by 2022. Adding to the 12,000 ton yearly capacity of the POSCO E&M plant, POSCO will be able to produce 62,000 tons of cathode materials per year, which can be used for batteries for one million EVs.
POSCO Chemtech, responsible for anode materials, another key material for secondary batteries, has expanded its plant in March and is capable of manufacturing 16,000 tons of anode materials per year.
POSCO ICT is Korea's largest private operator of EV charging infrastructure, running more than 3,000 chargers across the country. POSCO ICT said it is planning to export its infrastructure platform to Costa Rica and Uzbekistan, which will introduce EVs in the near future.
(Advertorial)