Chapter 992 Power Shortage
To be honest, Barron has come to understand more and more the reason why he had doubts in his previous life - why did those European countries, England, France, Germany... end up being so bad? Especially in England, the prime ministers are changed one after another, and all the policies are unclear. They are completely in a state of being laughed at...
The reality is that there is a growing trend throughout Europe that they are suffering from a serious "moral disease."
Well, sit on the throne of wealth that they have obtained through plunder and slavery for centuries and is paved with bones, and make moral judgments on other people.
The United States often talks about things like "civilization" and "values", but the problem is that the United States does this for profit. As long as the profit is sufficient, even Mauritania (the only country where slavery still exists) can become a Their closest companions…
Compared with the United States, many countries in Europe, whether their governments or their people, are a bit "silly and sweet". They can really harm their own interests because of their so-called "values"...
Now even if Barron hopes to increase the scale of British manufacturing, he still needs to face many problems.
Although the more complete welfare system for workers in the UK will increase the salary expenditure of industrial workers, this is not the biggest difficulty - you must know that the salary of German automobile workers can be said to be the highest in the world, but the German automobile industry, at least in The moment is still very strong.
In fact, even if workers' salaries are higher, the proportion of costs in products such as automobiles is not too high. What is more important is the improvement of the industrial chain.
Because most of the British automobile industry has been acquired by overseas capital, British brands including Rolls-Royce, Bentley, and MiNi have become heavily dependent on external supplies for many of their accessories.
It is not easy to gradually improve the British automobile industry chain. For example, the British Automobile Group has made breakthroughs in electric cars, but they also face many difficulties when they want to expand their battery production base in England, including local Public protests and environmental review by relevant British departments.
This means that they can currently only provide self-produced batteries for mid-to-high-end products, and the production capacity of this part of the battery is still insufficient. The rest of the battery products can only be obtained from cooperative manufacturers, such as CATL and BYD.
Many other automotive components also need to be imported from other European countries.
This has resulted in the British Automobile Group being able to only manufacture their relatively high-profit high-end models in the UK. The more competitive mid-range models, such as most Land Rover and Jaguar models, need to build factories overseas. manufacture.
Faced with China's lower labor costs and increasingly complete related industrial chains, these low-end and mid-range products from England are simply unable to compete.
"Next, we will try our best to maintain the manufacturing scale of high-end models in England. In fact, currently, generally speaking, China is the most suitable to build a new production plant. But there is a problem. According to local policies, only Build a factory there with its local joint venture manufacturers..."
Hearing Vandal Hauck’s complaint, Barron smiled and said:
"We can try to talk to them about whether we can obtain the qualification for sole proprietorship if we build our electric vehicle super factory in China."
Barron knew that Tesla was the first car company to build a factory in China as a wholly-owned subsidiary in the original time and space. After that, China issued new regulations, allowing new energy car companies to build factories in China as a wholly-owned subsidiary.
Although Tesla was only allowed to build a factory in Shanghai four years later, the two parties had already started many negotiations on this matter before that.
Barron plans to go to the United States in a while to test Musk's tone. At that time, Tesla and the British Automobile Group can go to the Magic City to conduct relevant negotiations. By then, the two companies with the best sales in the world can Under the temptation of electric car brands settling in Shanghai, it is likely that these restrictions will be lifted in advance.
"In addition, we are also inspecting Kolo to evaluate the feasibility of building a battery production factory there."
This choice was made not only because the interests of Colo and Barron are closely connected, and with the popularization of local education, the quality of workers can be said to be the highest in West Africa, but also because Colo itself produces a large amount of phosphate. Phosphate rock is one of the important upstream raw materials for battery production.
Moreover, the construction of a battery production plant in Colo will not face strict environmental review like in Europe, which can ensure the speed and scale of construction.
In addition, because Colo is an important energy supplier to the UK, Colo is currently negotiating with the British government. If a relevant agreement is reached, Colo will establish the closest trade relationship with the UK, thereby gaining access to other EU Under the same trade conditions between countries, battery supplies from the British electric vehicle production base will be exempted from most import taxes.
Therefore, what Barron said before about United Energy Group's preparation to build a nuclear power plant in Colo was not just a bargaining chip for Cameron, but a real plan.
After all, the entire West African region is very short of electricity. Currently, the domestic electricity supply in Kolo is the most sufficient in West Africa due to its investment in infrastructure.
But then the Kolo Development and Reform Research Center formulated an ambitious "Industrial Upgrading Plan" for Kolo, which will create conditions for the development of Kolo's manufacturing industry.
If this is the case, after more factories and production bases are built, there will be a shortage of electricity supply in Kolo. Think about the obstacles that the power shortage in Vietnam caused to their industrial undertaking in the original time and space, and you can understand how important the supply of electricity is to the manufacturing industry.
In addition, Kolo is close to the sea, which can be said to be the most suitable area for the construction of nuclear power plants in the West African Free Trade Organization. After the nuclear power plant in Kolo is built, in addition to solving the domestic power supply shortage, it can also be very convenient to export electricity to neighboring countries including Benin, Ghana and Burkina Faso.
Reading the error-free version! 6=9+Shu_bar first published this novel.
In this case, the disadvantage of the slightly higher power cost of the nuclear power plant is no longer a disadvantage.
Therefore, while the British Energy Group and China's CGN Group are negotiating on the cooperation of the Hinkley Point C nuclear power plant, the United Energy Group and the West African Power Group are also negotiating with each other on the establishment of the Kolo nuclear power plant.
You know, Niger, which is close to Kolo, has rich uranium mines, which is also a very favorable condition for Kolo to build a nuclear power plant.
Now China General Nuclear Power Group is also trying to promote their latest nuclear power technology in the international market. It can be said that the two sides hit it off, and even China is willing to provide a full interest-free loan for this project - China itself has many investments in Kolo, and Kolo is very much welcome to repay their loans with oil and other materials.