Wire and cable industry, "Twelfth Five-Year Plan" three goals and its countermeasures

Starting from the Eleventh Five-Year Plan, China's megacities began using high-voltage and ultra-high-voltage cable lines to penetrate urban load centers. During the Twelfth Five-Year Plan, 220 kV cross-linked cables mainly, along with a small number of 500 kV cable lines, will enter city centers. Large hydropower station construction also requires some 500 kV cables. However, to date, domestic 500 kV cables and accessories are all supplied from abroad. Although there are many domestic tower production lines (VCV), complete manufacturing of 500 kV cables and accessories is still not possible. 
　　In the "Twelfth Five-Year Plan for the Development of the Wire and Cable Industry" (draft for comments) made by the Wire and Cable Branch of the China Electrical Equipment Industry Association (hereinafter referred to as the "Cable Branch"), the development goals for China's cable industry during the Twelfth Five-Year Plan were listed. 

　　Three goals 
　　First, the industry should maintain steady economic growth and improve the quality and efficiency of development. It is expected that during the Twelfth Five-Year Plan, the industry's sales scale will grow annually by about 4% to 8%. By the end of the Twelfth Five-Year Plan, the predicted copper consumption is about 5.5 to 6.2 million tons, and aluminum consumption about 2.6 to 3.2 million tons. 
　　Second, enterprises should be strengthened and expanded, and the industrial organizational structure optimized. Through acquisitions, mergers, alliances, and other industrial restructuring activities, it is aimed that by the end of the Twelfth Five-Year Plan, 3 to 5 large enterprise groups with sales of several tens of billions of yuan and certain international competitiveness will be formed within the industry; 6 to 12 specialized enterprises with sales of 10 billion yuan and strong international competitiveness in specialized product fields will be established; a number of regional cable industry clusters with distinctive products, strong specialized manufacturing capabilities, relatively complete supporting facilities, and differentiated development will be formed; and a batch of small and medium-sized enterprises with specialized production characteristics and regional competitive advantages will be developed. 
　　Third, the industry should improve its technical level, increase the proportion of R&D personnel and R&D investment, and strengthen enterprises' technological innovation capabilities; advocate the establishment of industrial strategic technology alliances to achieve joint research and development, aiming to industrialize a batch of high-end products during the Twelfth Five-Year Plan and break through several industry and product technical bottlenecks. 
　　Comparing the development of China's cable industry during the Eleventh Five-Year Plan, it can be seen that this development plan estimates a lower growth rate for the cable industry's sales output value during the Twelfth Five-Year Plan than the actual figures of the Eleventh Five-Year Plan. It is understood that at the end of the Eleventh Five-Year Plan in 2005, China's cable industry sales output value was 282.959 billion yuan, just over one-third of the 731 billion yuan sales output value in 2009. In the following three years, the cable industry's sales output value in China achieved rapid growth each year, with increases exceeding 130 billion yuan and year-on-year growth rates above 20%. The growth in 2006 compared to 2005 even reached an astonishing 47.75%. However, this high growth is expected to slow down during the Twelfth Five-Year Plan. 
　　Alongside the slowing growth, the Cable Branch has expressed concern about persistent issues in the cable industry such as the lack of high-end products, chaotic competition in the mid-to-low-end market, low industry concentration, and severe shortage of high-quality talent. To guide industry development, the plan also points out some future research projects and new product development projects worthy of attention. 

　　Research Project Recommendations 
　　In the plan, the Cable Branch listed a total of nine research projects, including studies on the application fundamentals of high-voltage cross-linked cables, marine engineering series cables, optical fiber preform products, and superconducting cables. 
　　It is understood that China's high-voltage cross-linked cable insulation is generally too thick, and due to the lack of foundational application research, design parameters cannot currently be optimized. During the Twelfth Five-Year Plan, organizing relevant enterprises to conduct basic and long-term dynamic research on such cables and optimizing design parameters is very necessary. 
　　Starting from the Eleventh Five-Year Plan, China's megacities began using high-voltage and ultra-high-voltage cable lines to penetrate urban load centers. During the Twelfth Five-Year Plan, 220 kV cross-linked cables mainly, along with a small number of 500 kV cable lines, will enter city centers. Large hydropower station construction also requires some 500 kV cables. However, to date, domestic 500 kV cables and accessories are all supplied from abroad. Although there are many domestic tower production lines (VCV), complete manufacturing of 500 kV cables and accessories is still not possible. 
　　China's emphasis on marine development also makes research on marine engineering series cables essential. Marine engineering cables cover conventional operational cables for platform oil and gas extraction, as well as aluminum-core exploration cables for underwater oil and gas resources, and other underwater cables for shipwrecks, treasure hunting, geological and mineral exploration. Common cables for oil platforms include cables for above-water use, diving cables, flat cables, armored cables, load-bearing cables, integrated optical cables, and monitoring cables. It is reported that during the Twelfth Five-Year Plan, China's marine oil and gas development will generate 250 to 300 billion yuan in marine engineering equipment investment, and annually, 7,000 to 10,000 kilometers of various cables will be needed for new construction and maintenance of offshore oil platforms. However, the Cable Branch also warns that developing marine engineering cable series carries risks, requiring large equipment and investment, and facing fierce competition from well-known foreign manufacturers. 
　　The Cable Branch recommends research on optical fiber preform products and their manufacturing technology because these products are used to produce optical fibers, and raw materials such as SiC14 and GeC14 remain significant weaknesses in China. The import ratio of preforms in China exceeds 80%. It suggests that the state should initiate projects and concentrate funds to support 2 to 3 enterprises suitable for mass production of conventional optical fiber preforms, develop and promote equipment localization, especially the R&D of related supporting equipment, form an industrial chain for optical fiber preform manufacturing equipment, and rapidly improve China's optical fiber preform production capacity. At the same time, it recommends increasing support for special optical fiber preforms, encouraging enterprises to target the international high-tech frontier, conduct application basic research, key technology, and common technology research for special fields, and enhance independent innovation capabilities. 
　　Regarding superconducting cable research currently undertaken by the United States, Japan, and Europe, the Cable Branch suggests that during the Twelfth Five-Year Plan, China must conduct technical research on low-temperature insulated high-temperature superconducting cables to lay a technical foundation for replacing traditional cables in ultra-high-voltage large-capacity power transmission systems. The focus should be on cable manufacturing technology, combined with other professional technologies for scientific research and development. 
　　Starting from the Eleventh Five-Year Plan, China's megacities began using high-voltage and ultra-high-voltage cable lines to penetrate urban load centers. During the Twelfth Five-Year Plan, 220 kV cross-linked cables mainly, along with a small number of 500 kV cable lines, will enter city centers. Large hydropower station construction also requires some 500 kV cables. However, to date, domestic 500 kV cables and accessories are all supplied from abroad. Although there are many domestic tower production lines (VCV), complete manufacturing of 500 kV cables and accessories is still not possible. Therefore, research on high-voltage and ultra-high-voltage cross-linked cables and accessories has been included in research projects. The Cable Branch suggests conducting related basic theoretical research, focusing on design parameters, elimination of thermal stress, process requirements, testing technology, accessory design, and prefabrication process, to trial-produce 500 kV cross-linked cables, outdoor terminals, and GIS terminal samples, laying a foundation to ensure product quality stability and engineering application. 
　　In addition to the above projects, research on wire and cable material recycling technology, reliability and application research of domestically produced composite reinforced core materials for high-voltage overhead transmission lines, research on high solid content varnish and coating processes, and research on cyclic load current carrying capacity and real-time current carrying capacity have also been included in the Twelfth Five-Year Plan research projects. 

　　New Product Development Recommendations 
　　In the plan, the Cable Branch also recommended some new product development directions for many enterprises, including the development of 220 kV high-voltage cable complete accessories, localization of 1E class K1 type cables for nuclear power plants, and development and improvement of cables for aerospace. 
　　It is understood that one of the reasons hindering the application of domestically produced high-voltage and ultra-high-voltage cross-linked cables in China is the lack of matching accessories, which cannot be supplied as a complete set. Therefore, in the recommended new product development, the Cable Branch will once again include the development of 220kV high-voltage cable complete accessories; China's nuclear power plants have entered an accelerated development stage, but currently only one company in China can produce 1E level K1 class cables, and production capacity needs to be strengthened; to develop the large aircraft industry, China needs irradiated cross-linked ethylene-tetrafluoroethylene copolymer and TFE/PI/PTFE film-wrapped sintered wires, and there are still issues with material localization and process stability to be resolved; the development of various optoelectronic composite cables should also be strengthened during the 12th Five-Year Plan period. Currently, domestic applications have begun in power cables, but not yet in electrical equipment wires and cables. Enterprises should develop fiber optic composite elevator cables, fiber optic composite mine cables, fiber optic composite marine cables, fiber optic composite oil platform cables, etc., according to the development requirements of various industries during the 12th Five-Year Plan; motor, transformer, and electronic component coils generally use high-speed automated operations during winding, embedding, and shaping processes, requiring enameled wires to have excellent heat-resistant processing performance to minimize damage during manufacturing. Therefore, the development of tough enameled wires needs to be strengthened. 
　　In addition, the Cable Branch also recommends new product development directions such as cable development for high-speed rail transit, emerging fiber optic development, capacity-increasing heat-resistant aluminum alloy development, high-voltage plastic insulated DC cable development, and the development of new conductor series such as ice-resistant conductors, self-damping conductors, low-corona conductors, and corrosion-resistant conductors. 
　　A careful observation reveals that the Cable Branch chooses these projects or products as development priorities during the 12th Five-Year Plan either for the healthy development of the industry or to meet market demand. For example, for rail transit cables, it is reported that during the 12th Five-Year Plan, the acceleration of railway construction in China will bring huge demand for locomotive cables, communication, and signal cables, with an expected annual average demand of 160,000 to 200,000 kilometers and 70,000 to 100,000 kilometers respectively. Urban rail transit will generate an annual demand of 25,000 to 30,000 kilometers for vehicle cables and 15,000 to 20,000 kilometers for traffic signal cables; for aerospace cables, the large aircraft manufacturing plan will drive demand for high-performance lightweight cables represented by tetrafluoroethylene copolymer insulated cables and polyimide-polytetrafluoroethylene composite insulated cables, with an expected future annual average demand of 12,000 to 15,000 kilometers. The rapid growth of airport construction provides a large market space for airport distribution power cables and runway lighting cables. The demand for special cables such as fire-resistant, fireproof, silicone cables, and halogen-free low-smoke cables will multiply; the motor and transformer industries' demand for winding wires is growing at an annual rate of 1.5% to 2%, and by the end of the 12th Five-Year Plan, the demand for corona-resistant and special performance winding wires is expected to achieve a breakthrough, which is also why tough enameled wires are included in the development directions.