Additional context, BYD's factory size: https://x.com/taylorogan/status/1859146242519167249
Discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42228138
Living in Australia, I chose a BYD over a Tesla. After previously owning a Nissan Leaf, I can clearly see why BYD is leading the EV market.
Why?
Not to mention that it doesn’t have the battery degradation that my leaf suffered from. Nissan engineers messed up big time by leaving proper battery thermal management, giving edge to newcomers like BYD.
Price to build quality/package ratio. For AUD 36ks you can get a BYD Dolphin Premium with blade LFP battery, which will give you around 450 to 500ks of range.Why would you buy a Tesla?
Vertically integrating. Not as subtle as I'd have expected, but still sensible.
That's pushing vertical integration to extremes. Is there any precedent to car carriers dedicated to one manufacturer? Wikipedia mentions a "Toyota Maru No. 10" which was NOT owned by Toyota - although I don't know if it was dedicated to them.
> Is there any precedent to car carriers dedicated to one manufacturer?
General Motors helped design the Vert-A-Pac. https://chevyvega.fandom.com/wiki/Vert-A-Pac
Cool engineering, thank you.
Not exclusively cars but Hyundai got into the game early, buying pure car carriers in the 80’s:
Sorta makes sense -- the first time Germany noticed Korea in the 80s is when their shipyards started outbidding the German ones.
https://www.maritimegateway.com/volkswagen-group-orders-lng-...
These are also not owned by VW Logistics, but on long-term lease to them.
Note this is the similar for several BYD RoRo carriers, e.g. the BYD Explorer No.1 and BYD Changzhou are owned by Zodiac Maritime and chartered by/leased to BYD.
As to why a UK-based shipping company owned by a Israeli billionaire based in Monaco buys RoRo carriers from a Chinese shipyard, and then leases them back to a Chinese car maker, I don't know. But I'm also quite curious about the regulatory and financing-related incentives and money flows involved. I'm aware this kind of setup is called a "Non-operating owner" and is fairly common.
Okay fair enough thank you. The article points at just Volkswagen running 9 car carriers just for the north atlantic.
And BYD have been at it for a while, so time for a wholly owned one I guess.
> As to why a UK-based shipping company owned by a Israeli billionaire based in Monaco buys RoRo carriers from a Chinese shipyard, and then leases them back to a Chinese car maker, I don't know.
That's good. No idea if that's the reason, but that would be an easy way to invest in BYD while mostly not being subject to Chinese direct investing legal requirements and problems.
Can it unload "cars" on the beach?
The number of RORO ships is directly proportional to the volume of automobile exports. As of 2022, China had only 100 such ships, accounting for just 14% of the global fleet. However, considering that Chinese shipbuilding enterprises currently have orders for an additional 200 RORO ships, it is possible that in the future, China's share of the global roll-on/roll-off fleet could reach one-third.
Their workers work 12 hrs a day and only get 2 days off per month. It's the worst kind of modern slavery. I don't think they can produce even qualified cars under such pressure.
Which factory?
Shenzhen, Changsha, Huizhou, Shanxi, Shanghai (in China), the one in Thailand, in Hungary or Uzbekistan? (etc.)
I ask as Reuters reported the Shenzhen and other plants as having standard eight hour shifts less than two years past: https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/byd-re...
Do you have a source for claim?
Can't you just google a little bit more?
[0] https://www.scmp.com/economy/global-economy/article/3293923/...
[1] https://carnewschina.com/2024/05/20/strike-at-byd-factory-in...
[2] https://clb.org.hk/en/content/auto-workers-bear-brunt-compet...
> Can't you just google a little bit more?
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
[1] is extremely vague wrt hard details, in summary it's a dispute between Brazilian standard conditions and Chinese standard with hints of "slave like conditions" but nothing concrete.
[2] is about Chinese workers striking to demand longer hours:
According to reports, the main reason for the employees’ discontent was the implementation of a four-shift system and a five-day, eight-hour work schedule. This would result in the loss of overtime pay, leading to a significant reduction in their income.
[3] references workers striking for better pay, safer conditions, et al but doesn't mention slave like conditons etc. that you claimed
Why does the Heifei look like 1/3 of a cruise liner? What happened to the badonk tail end?
https://electrek.co/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2025/01/BYD-W...
To be fair, it's pretty large. If you zoom in, you can see some people in a door near the middle of the image, and they're nearly microscopic.
Edit: link updated with alternate documentary video without AI content, please reply with a better video if you find one on roros.
That feels very AI-generated and not in a good way.
The back 1/4 of the ship is angled at for a ramp that flips down for unloading. It makes the ship look narrower from the angle the photo was taken.
RORO car carriers aren't novel concept at all...
GOOD Point by my wife. Could they double purpose these ships as ferries? Seems like the same basic concept.
It's not well advertised, but you can book voyages on many cargo ships. They just give you one of the crew cabins and pack some more food. Expect to be the only passenger.
There are some issues though. It's slow (slower than an ocean liner since ships are more efficient at low speeds). And it's a cargo vessel, so the cargo sets the schedule. If there's an issue with the cargo that delays the ship by three weeks, you journey is delayed by three weeks. There also just isn't much happening. You have a room, a mess hall, a crew of maybe half a dozen to a dozen people to talk to, a ship to walk around on, and not much else.
It's more of a "the journey is the destination" thing. Accordingly there are a couple youtube channels documenting such journeys
I think there are no climate controls to cool/heat the air to acceptable human levels inside the parking area. I remember seeing on the local news that the inside of the ship looked like a tightly packed parking lot, which seemed to be done by machinery to maximize occupancy.
Here is the only photo I could find: https://movimentoeconomico.com.br/wp-content/uploads/2024/05...
Probably not enough space for people. Often people aren't allowed to stay in their cars.
After the Ticktock ban and surge of Rednote installs, more people are seeing these cars here. And they look amazing for the price. The ban is backfiring spectacularly. And this is just one way.
Ten thousand EV batteries packed into a ship’s hull.
What could go wrong?
I actually assumed that was part of the impetus for creating their own ship – standard cargo ships probably aren't well-suited to the job and simultaneously are a bit concerned about transporting such cargo.
Specialized car carriers are fairly common. Maybe they added some changes to make this one especially well suited for EVs, like modified fire suppression systems. But it may well be a standard ro-ro ship with an LNG engine.
It would be cool to pull charge off the batteries to power the ship.
The ship runs on LNG, which is probably cleaner than charging the cars in China and using that for energy, given China's grid mix.
It seems to already use some batteries, but not sure for what:
“the new ship includes BYD box-type battery packs and shaft-belt generators for the first time”
I estimate that all those batteries would get that ship at most 20% of the way across the Pacific.
Salt water spray is not great for vehicles in general, even ignoring batteries. Wonder what the heck they were thinking.
Realistically, what is the concern for EV batteries? They already make up a pretty substantial amount of market chair in the US, and yet I don’t hear stories about EV’s being more dangerous or more prone to fires or anything. The only time you ever really see an EV burning is one that was in an accident, and guess what, gas cars also blow up when they’re in an accident sometimes
In terms of fire risk, ten thousand gasoline cars are worse. And they have to be fueled because the cars are driven in and out of the carrier.
EV fires are harder to put out, but in every other way this isn't different from any other car carrier
You could say the same thing about a refined fuel tanker.
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Seems like a witch hunt to me. OP's history is relatively diverse, and the comments are not lacking in content or argument. Having opinions is not a vile "ulterior motive".
what is the motive? I did not see any pattern from the op's history post
You mean I'm interested in EVs and I'm unimpressed with oligarchs?
Oh no. You caught me.
Textbook
Can’t be promoting Chinese companies around here. /s We are going through a rehash of the good old Red Scare.
This ship might not be for peacefully exporting electric cars. China is making unmistakable preparations to invade Taiwan in the near future and RORO carrier vessels have clear military applications in such a scenario.
Consider this analysis of the invasion barges they’re preparing: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Klkpk_hO4FQ
Why not both like Merchant Marines.
Dual use sealift is just common sense. Too many years of stupid western analysis that PRC would waste $$$ to build dedicated TW amphib fleet, and point the absence of one as PRC not ready to invade TW. Reality is every $$$ PLAN spends on sealift is one not spent on weapons shooting back at US+co.
PRC RO/ROs (and a lot of other commercial shipping) are indeed build to military standards for TW scenario. Used for shipping cars like they're suppose to during peacetime to let that capex work, and armor vehicles during war.
Comparable RO/ROs have been actively involved in invasion TW training/exercises. PRC RO/RO numbers a couple years ago was enough to land 7 full PLA group armies (300k + equipment) on TW in about 10 days, or every US Army Brigade Combat team in 5 days. They'll probably have enough RO/RO sealift to cut that down to 2-3 days in a few more years.
China still has an amphib fleet, and there are reasons to use amphibs for at least the initial forced entry operation, but once you have a beachhead the dual use ROROs are a good way to sustain and reinforce the landing force without needing to capture or build a port facility.
And it’s not like the amphibs are only useful for Taiwan; there are plenty of disputed islands in the South China Sea worth fighting over.
Specialized pieces of amphib equipment for initial landing, but bulk of sealift is going to be done via commercial ships / RO/ROs. Likely down to 100,000s of fishing boats / commercial vessels to distribute survivability for a reverse dunkirk. Point is PLAN never had intention to build out enough gray hulls to ferry 100,000s men + equipment, so analysts/arguments fixating on PRC _military_ sealift readiness needs to recalibrate on what % of sealift work will actually be done by military procured hulls. My guess is... very minor %, and a shockingly many of commercial ships will get drafted / voluntold to assist with sealift.
SCS islands are too small to need amphib. Like even largest Taiping island is basically just a 1km long airstrip. LHD + paratroopers is enough. Maybe for Ryukyus if things get really spicy.
Car shipping RORO vessels aren't LSTs... They can't beach and land tanks. Amphibian tanks can roll on and off amphibious assault ships, but this isn't it.
You probably wouldn’t use a ship like this in an initial landing, but once you’d secured a beachhead you could easily use it to deliver reinforcements and supplies. A major part of the value of a RORO ship is that you need little to no port infrastructure to unload it. Once you’ve secured a beachhead and built some minimal infrastructure on it you could land tanks and other armored vehicles, or you could also land trucks filled with fuel, ammunition, supplies, infantry, and so forth. This is, in practice, most of the work that LST’s did as well.
And it’s very common to requisition merchant RORO ships for amphibious operations. The British did so during the Falklands War (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Atlantic_Conveyor).
That is a very good observation and a really interesting video.
Yeah, I watched the video the other day and when I saw the phrase “world’s largest car carrier” I instantly thought of the photo of all of the Chinese tanks loaded onto a RORO. And this ship is even bigger? Hmmmmm…
I'm just here to say electrek's continuous scroll both delights and annoys me by equal measures (because of my right click new tab habit)
This is a giant RoRo. Compared to the one I used to cross the St Lawrence River a few years back, you could pack hundreds of them inside this in a meta meta car carrier.
So Internet apps are banned but data collection devices like electric vehicles are permitted. BYD of course has a privacy policy, but who knows what is actually collected. The same applies to other EV manufacturers.
I suppose one can only buy 30 year old second hand vehicles.
