Atmospheric monitoring instruments coexist with both opportunities and challenges

As atmospheric pollution prevention and control efforts continue to increase, the market for atmospheric monitoring is promising. However, at present, the domestic air monitoring industry is still in its infancy, showing a situation in which technology is controlled by people and market competition is chaotic. The development of the industry needs to be effectively regulated.

Atmospheric monitoring is promising

With the continuous improvement of air pollution prevention and control, the need to strengthen the quality management of monitoring data and objectively reflect the air quality is increasing. According to the “Ten Articles on Prevention and Control of Atmospheric Pollution” and the “Ambient Air Quality Standards” promulgated and issued by the Ministry of Environmental Protection, by 2015, cities at or above the prefecture level will be built with monitoring points for fine particulate matter and national direct monitoring. Build county-level stations and rural stations. These monitoring stations will add monitoring equipment such as PM 2.5, O 3, and CO in batches in accordance with the requirements of the “new standards” for air quality monitoring. Some agencies predict that the atmospheric monitoring equipment industry will usher in a boom in procurement.

It is reported that at present, a domestically-made or imported PM 2.5 instrument is priced between 150,000 and 400,000 RMB, and a new atmospheric monitoring station will be built with a complete set of equipment, and the minimum cost will be around RMB 1.3 million. In the “12th Five-Year Plan” period, more than 1,500 PM 2.5 monitoring sites will be added to the country. For example, each additional site will be equipped with a complete set of air monitoring instruments. As a result, the initial investment will exceed RMB 2 billion, including PM 2.5. The instrument sales market will reach 300 million to 800 million yuan.

In addition to instrument investment, the renewal and maintenance of late-stage instruments will bring a continuously growing market space. According to public information, the average service life of a monitoring instrument ranges from 3 to 8 years. After the service life is reached, the whole machine needs to be discarded and re-purchased. This will bring about continuous growth in the sales market of related instruments.

According to the Nanjing Environmental Protection Bureau, a set of 6-parameter conventional monitoring factor costs about 150,000 yuan (including consumables, accessories, standard gas, communications, labor, etc.) for a year, and the lease fee varies from thousands of From RMB to tens of thousands, the annual operating cost is about 15% of the instrument purchase price. Based on this calculation, 1,500 monitoring stations will be added to the 12th Five-Year Plan in China, and the annual operating and maintenance costs will exceed 200 million yuan.

The reporter learned from a number of air monitoring equipment backbone enterprises such as Xianhe Group, Concentration Technology that the current manufacturers are generally optimistic about the future market development. In 2013 alone, Hebei Xianhe Air Monitoring System sold more than 400 sets, and its cumulative sales of PM 2.5 automatic monitors reached more than 500 sets. The company believes that the national policy provides a new space for the development of environmental monitoring equipment companies, in addition to conventional air monitoring stations, will also expand the new market development space for heavy metals, volatile organic compounds monitoring, source analysis services.

Industry development faces multiple obstacles

The reporter learned from a number of domestic backbone enterprises in the atmospheric monitoring industry that the current technology of China's air monitoring instrumentation industry is not mature enough because of its lack of technical funds, low research and development capabilities, low level of repetition, and the types, quality, and performance of the instrument are difficult to communicate with abroad. As enterprises are contending, the development of the industry faces multiple obstacles.

According to different monitoring principles, PM 2.5 monitoring instruments can be further divided into spectrum method, shock balance method and β-ray method. At present, the latter two methods are commonly used in China. Taking the production of β-ray particle monitors as an example, domestic companies such as Xianhe Environmental Protection (China), Concentration Technology, Wuhan Yuhong, and Zhongyin Tyco are able to produce related products. However, domestically produced instruments cannot Do a continuous reading for 24 hours. Taking the Oscillation Balance Particle Monitor as an example, at present, only Blueland Optoelectronics Co., Ltd. and Wuhan Yuhong Co., Ltd. are both producing in China, but the related products of the two companies are at the initial stage. In general, foreign instruments are relatively mature in terms of product R&D, production, sales, etc. compared with domestically produced similar products. After a long period of time, the products are relatively stable.

Li Yuguo, president of Hebei Xianhe Science and Technology Development Co., Ltd., said that most companies stay in the area of ​​technical imitation and have insufficient capacity for independent innovation. At present, the domestic PM 2.5 monitoring equipment has obvious disadvantages in terms of market share, stability, and product advancement, and it has certain advantages only in terms of cost.

With domestic brands starting late and technologies being immature, foreign product purchases are still the mainstream of the market. According to Xianhe Environmental Protection, due to the early development and promotion of foreign environmental protection products, and the large scale of foreign companies, ranking top in the world, the awareness of the domestic environmental protection market is higher than the domestic brands of environmental protection products. Some of the economically developed regions still host high-priced imported equipment in the bidding and procurement projects organized by themselves.

Taking the Shanghai area as an example, PM 2.5 monitoring instruments purchased by 10 city-level inspection stations are all shock-balance meter monitors manufactured by Thermo Fisher Scientific. In fact, in the PM 2.5 monitoring equipment and technology, foreign manufacturers have always held the market discourse. Pan Yuhong, a researcher with the China Investment Group's environmental protection industry, said that the domestic monitoring equipment and technology for PM 2.5 is still mainly dependent on imports, and the market share of non-domestic PM 2.5 monitoring equipment is over 70%, which may be detrimental to domestic companies participating in the competition.

In addition, some companies also reflected that in recent years, as environmental protection has become a domestic hot spot, and due to various reasons such as the implementation of environmental monitoring product standards, many companies that do not possess technology and do not have production and after-sales service capabilities are faced with a national policy dividend. In order to participate in market competitions by taking advantage of malicious bidding and other methods, this small and scattered pattern is not conducive to the healthy and rapid development of the industry.

People in the industry believe that mastering high-tech technology is the key to mastering the air monitoring industry. On the one hand, domestic enterprises should strengthen independent innovation, give full play to local advantages, and enhance their own competitiveness. On the other hand, the state should strengthen the guidance and support of the air monitoring industry from the macro level, promote scientific and technological innovation, and achieve sound development of the industry.

“For enterprises, if they want to get a slice of the environmental protection industry, they will inevitably face the pressure of international market competition and the certification of international technical standards.” Li Yuguo said that this requires, on the one hand, ethnic enterprises need to enhance their awareness of independent innovation. , increase self-development efforts, on the other hand, domestic companies need to introduce, digest and absorb foreign advanced technology and management experience, or use the capital market to achieve the acquisition of core technology foreign companies, so as to quickly enhance the company's technology research and development capabilities, improve The overall technical level of the industry, and give play to the local advantages, objectively analyze the difficulties in domestic environmental governance, and develop products that adapt to the national conditions.

At the same time, some companies also expect the country to strengthen support for leading enterprises in technological innovation, encourage enterprises to participate in international competition, and carry out technological innovation.

First, when formulating national guidelines for major environmental protection technology research projects, we should actively absorb the participation of leading enterprises, fully investigate the various needs of leading enterprises in the research of key technologies, and the conversion of key achievements, and provide guidance and resources for coordination. After realizing industrialization, we must Promote the promotion of new technologies and new achievements at the national policy level.

Second, innovate the financial policy and establish a leading enterprise technology innovation guarantee fund. Due to the long period of major technology research and development, and the large amount of funds used, and the rapid progress in world science and technology, and the ever-changing market demands, companies investing huge amounts of R&D funds are likely to face the situation that products and technologies are not sold and marketed. Dare to invest too much and restrict the technological innovation of enterprises and industries. For this reason, reducing the risks borne by companies in the form of guarantee funds will greatly stimulate the technological innovation of enterprises.

Third, the procurement of government fiscal funds should be tilted toward domestic products with independent intellectual property rights, which is also an international practice. In addition, we will further cultivate innovative soil, increase support for corporate science and technology innovation projects, and create more opportunities for leading enterprises to participate in the formulation of national legislation, national or industry standards, and fully implement R&D tax rebates, etc. Encourage enterprises to carry out technological innovations.