A CATL production site in Ningde, Fujian, where the company is headquartered, caught fire in one of the rare accidents in battery manufacturing.
Chinese power battery giant CATL has seen a fire at one of its production bases, one of the rare accidents in the sector.
A fire broke out at CATL's production base Z in Ningde city, Fujian province, where the company is headquartered, this morning, and the flames had not been fully extinguished as of 2:40 pm Beijing time, according to a report in local media outlet Cailian.
The fire broke out at the production site at around 11 am Beijing time, the report said, citing an eyewitness at the scene.
Firefighters began extinguishing the fire just as it started, and staff were quickly evacuated, with no injuries so far, the report said, citing a staff member from the Emergency Management Bureau of Ningde city.
Separately, another local media outlet, 21jingji, cited a staff member at a grocery store near the production site as saying that the fire broke out around 11 am to 12 pm today, and that about a dozen fire trucks came to put out the fire.
Another person in charge of a restaurant near the production site said the smell of smoke was detected around 12:30 pm and the fire was huge, according to the report.
Speaking about the impact of the fire, CATL chairman Robin Zeng said it was not a big problem, according to Jiemian.
CATL is the world's largest maker of power batteries, with customers including Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA), Nio (NYSE: NIO) and Li Auto (NASDAQ: LI), among a large number of other automakers.
It's unclear what products are made at the manufacturing facility and who their main customers are.
CATL ranked first in the world with a 37.6 percent share of the 163.3 GWh of batteries loaded in the January-July period, according to data released on September 4 by South Korean market researcher SNE Research.
CATL opened an experience center in Chengdu, Sichuan province, on August 10 to showcase EV models equipped with its batteries, the first such showroom for a battery maker.
The showroom brings together nearly 100 models from nearly 50 car brands, including Nio's ES8, ES6, ET7, ET5 and ET5 Touring, Tesla's Model 3 and Model Y, and Xiaomi's SU7.
As of June, CATL's batteries have been used in more than 14.05 million new energy vehicles (NEVs), it said on August 10.
Of the top 50 selling NEVs globally this year, 27 are powered by CATL batteries, according to the company.
CATL suspending lithium production in Jiangxi, sending lithium producer shares soaring
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