The project launch ceremony site. Photo by Cong Yumeng. "We will designate this project as the city's top priority project for this year!" said a principal official of the Zigong Municipal Committee on January 23, during the inauguration ceremony of the CALB power battery and energy storage battery Zigong base project held in the Zigong High-tech Industrial Development Zone. The official emphasized the city's full commitment to ensuring the project's swift completion, early operation, and rapid attainment of designed capacity.
As a globally leading new energy enterprise, the Zigong project represents another crucial strategic move by CALB within Sichuan Province, with the base expected to be completed and operational within the year. Following its existing bases in Chengdu and Meishan, why did the company choose Zigong this time? CALB is pursuing a global layout across China, Europe, and ASEAN. Within Sichuan, the company already operates production bases in locations like Chengdu and Meishan. In recent years, sustained rapid growth prompted the decision to establish an additional production facility. Upon learning of this opportunity, the Zigong municipal government proactively engaged and efficiently facilitated the project's landing, completing the process in under four months.
"We will leverage the Zigong project as a pivotal point to drive synergistic development across the industrial chain, promote the aggregation and transformation of scientific and technological innovation resources, and contribute substantial momentum to Zigong and the entire province in strategically upgrading the industrial structure, building a modern industrial system, and achieving high-quality development," stated a relevant company executive.
In recent years, Zigong has preliminarily established a power and energy storage battery industrial chain covering electrolytes, high-performance conductive materials, and battery structural components. Companies including Zhonglan Tian, Jiangsu Guotai, Wuxi Dongheng, Changying Precision, and Jiangsu Tianjun have successively established a presence, fostering collaborative linkages with lithium battery industry clusters in neighboring cities like Yibin and Suining. Furthermore, Zigong maintains a regular reserve of nearly a thousand acres of readily available industrial land, enabling rapid project initiation and construction.
Sichuan's drive to build a world-class power battery industrial cluster gains fresh momentum. Sichuan has already incorporated new energy vehicles and power batteries (including energy storage) into its "15+N" key industrial chains. The province aims for its output of power and energy storage batteries to account for one-fifth of the national total by 2025. Sichuan is intensifying efforts to build a world-leading power battery cluster; prior to this, cities like Chengdu, Yibin, Suining, and Meishan have already formed a multi-pillar industrial landscape supported by major players like CATL, Tianqi Lithium, and SVOLT.
Just one day before the launch ceremony, statistics released by the Zigong Municipal Bureau of Statistics indicated that the city's GDP successfully surpassed the 200 billion yuan mark in 2025, with the new energy industry becoming a crucial pillar of its economic growth. The principal official of the Zigong Municipal Committee stated that the project's landing holds significant strategic importance for Zigong's industrial upgrade. It is expected to decisively drive the aggregation of high-quality production capacity from the new energy battery industrial chain in Zigong, injecting powerful momentum into the city's efforts to build a robust new energy industry ecosystem and achieve comprehensive, high-quality development.