Moving Towards' New ', Large-scale Equipment Updates Empower Industrial Transformation And Upgrading

Industry is the leading industry of the national economy. The latest data from the National Bureau of Statistics shows that in the first quarter of 2024, the utilization rate of industrial capacity above designated size in China was 73.6%, a decrease of 0.7 percentage points from the same period last year and a decrease of 2.3 percentage points from the previous quarter. With the deepening of the new industrialization process, the demand for advanced equipment in the industrial sector will continue to grow, and industrial manufacturing has become a key area for large-scale equipment updates.
Recently, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and seven other departments jointly issued the "Implementation Plan for Promoting Equipment Renewal in the Industrial Sector" (hereinafter referred to as the "Implementation Plan"), which clearly states that by 2027, the scale of equipment investment in the industrial sector will increase by more than 25% compared to 2023, and the popularization rate of digital research and development design tools and key process CNC rate of industrial enterprises above designated size will exceed 90% and 75% respectively. The digital transformation of industrial enterprises in large provinces, cities, and key industrial parks will be fully covered.
Promoting the upgrading of large-scale equipment in the industrial sector is not only conducive to driving effective investment and promoting technological progress, but also to continuously increasing the proportion of advanced production capacity and promoting industrial upgrading. Several experts have stated that this measure is of great significance for accelerating the construction of a modern industrial system, and also helps to accelerate the cultivation of new quality productivity.
Digital transformation helps promote high-quality development of intelligent manufacturing
The construction of an intelligent blade processing workshop in a steam turbine factory in Heilongjiang is progressing in an orderly manner. It is understood that this intelligent transformation project separates the processes of equipment mechanical processing, fitter polishing, etc., to achieve process layout optimization and clean and green production; The traditional manual loading and unloading operations and manual inspection records have been transformed into automated operations and digital online detection, achieving full sequence and full process automation, and promoting intelligent manufacturing through "smart transformation and digital transformation".
China is an industrialized country, with a total industrial added value of 39.9 trillion yuan in 2023, accounting for 31.7% of GDP. The manufacturing added value accounts for over 30% of the global total, ranking first in the world for 14 consecutive years. There is a huge demand for equipment updates in the industrial sector.
China has 41 major industrial categories, 207 medium industrial categories, and 666 small industrial categories. The Implementation Plan will replace existing inefficient equipment, update high-end advanced equipment, and upgrade testing equipment from different perspectives, "said Yu Xiaohui, President of the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology.
In the smart factory of a smart innovation service industrial park in Tianjin, the warehouse responsible for storing, managing, and transporting hundreds or thousands of raw materials and finished products maintains a "black light" state, while AGV intelligent handling robots shuttle back and forth, working efficiently in the "dark". The company updates its production line equipment by using automated tools such as robotic arms for production and quality inspection. In the testing process, the fully automated system can test over 150 items in 8 categories within 2 hours, with 100% black light capability throughout the entire process, balancing production efficiency and product quality.
Intelligent technology can improve the efficiency of energy systems, reduce energy consumption and emissions, while also bringing new production models and industries, "said Hu Qimu, Deputy Director of the Strategic Emerging Industries Research Center at Tsinghua University and Deputy Secretary General of the China Digital Reality Integration 50 Person Forum. By applying digital technology, the supply chain can be more flexible, the market's sensitivity to supply and demand signals can be increased, and a" small order quick return "production model can be achieved, thereby establishing a competitive advantage in the market.
Green transformation promotes energy conservation and carbon reduction in the industrial sector
Industry is the main engine of China's economic growth, and comprehensively promoting industrial energy conservation and green low-carbon development is an inherent requirement for breaking through energy, resource, and environmental constraints, accelerating the promotion of new industrialization, and cultivating new driving forces for economic growth and forming green productivity. The relevant person in charge of the Energy Conservation and Comprehensive Utilization Department of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology emphasized that the steel industry plays an important role in industrial energy conservation, carbon reduction, and green low-carbon development. It is necessary to use various means such as technology promotion, benchmarking, and low-carbon transformation to systematically promote energy conservation, carbon reduction, and green development in the steel industry.
In recent years, China's steel industry has carried out the "ultimate energy efficiency" renovation project and achieved good results. Data shows that in 2023, the comprehensive energy consumption per ton of steel in China's key steel enterprises will be 558 kilograms of standard coal, a decrease of 7.4% compared to 2012; The energy consumption of related blast furnaces decreased by 0.47% year-on-year, and the energy consumption of converters decreased by 7.97% year-on-year, which is equivalent to reducing the total energy consumption of 1.5 million tons of standard coal.
Recently, the 80 ton converter green and low-carbon upgrade project of a steel plant in Inner Mongolia was completed. The equipment body, vaporization cooling system, tilting machinery, oxygen lance system, converter feeding system, bottom blowing system, and auxiliary electrical system underwent three rounds of dust removal and ultra-low emission transformation. During the process, intelligent means such as bomb throwing devices and audio slag removal were used to comprehensively achieve energy conservation, consumption reduction, negative energy steelmaking, and improve product quality.
The low-carbon and green transformation of production equipment injects vitality into the low-carbon transformation of the industrial sector, and key energy consuming equipment is an important lever for energy conservation and carbon reduction work. The recently implemented "Advanced Energy Efficiency Level, Energy Conservation Level, and Access Level of Key Energy consuming Product Equipment (2024 Edition)" includes 38 important product equipment with greater energy consumption and energy-saving transformation potential, and more urgent energy-saving indicators in the regulations. It is expected to save about 55 million tons of standard coal and reduce carbon dioxide emissions by about 120 million tons annually.
Yu Xiaohui stated that digitization and greenization are the two major directions for the current and future development of the manufacturing industry, as well as the two technological variables that will affect the overall development and transformation of the manufacturing industry and its global competitive advantage. The promotion of green equipment is the most important measure to achieve the carbon peak and carbon neutrality goals in the industrial sector.
Standardization and standardization ensure stable and far-reaching equipment updates
Shandong implements a comprehensive standard improvement project, proposes to revise a batch of local energy consumption limit standards, and leads equipment updates; Shanxi Province has issued the "Implementation Plan for Promoting Large scale Equipment Renewal and Consumer Goods Trade in" to promote the formulation, revision, and implementation of standards in key areas; Zhejiang Province has implemented energy efficiency standards and proposed to promote the energy efficiency of production lines (devices) in key areas such as steel to reach the benchmark level or above by 2027, and the proportion of energy efficiency benchmark level production capacity to exceed 50%... Various regions across the country have taken action to improve relevant standards to safeguard equipment updates.
The new round of large-scale equipment updates and consumer goods trade in has an important characteristic of adhering to standard guidance. Relevant experts suggest that we should better leverage the traction of energy consumption, emissions, technology and other standards to promote the elimination of potential bottlenecks and difficulties.
Recently, the State Administration for Market Regulation and seven other departments jointly issued the "Action Plan for Upgrading Traction Equipment and Replacing Old Consumer Products with New Standards", proposing to implement the standard upgrading action, accelerate the formulation and revision of standards in energy conservation, carbon reduction, environmental protection, safety, recycling and other fields. It is expected that by 2025, a total of 294 key national standards will be formulated and revised, providing strong support for equipment upgrading and replacing old consumer products with new ones.
Data shows that there are currently 99 energy consumption limit standards in China, covering many industries such as electricity, steel, building materials, non-ferrous metals, and chemicals; There are 78 mandatory national standards for energy efficiency of terminal energy products and equipment, covering areas such as household appliances, commercial equipment, industrial equipment, office equipment, and lighting fixtures.
To combine with the actual situation of enterprises, we should reorganize and optimize the national quality standards of various industries, appropriately raise the standards, and truly force industrial upgrading and eliminate backward production capacity from the quality level. Relevant experts suggest establishing a unified national high-quality development standard system, so that production activities in various industries can consciously optimize processes, improve technology, upgrade equipment under the new standards, and truly achieve effective improvement in quality and reasonable growth in quantity.