China to see over 20,000 new filling stations open

They predict gas stations will mushroom in china in the near future along with the promotion and application of natural gas vehicles, numbering roughly 20,000 in 2025.

The development of the national economy and the improvement of people's living standards in China has seen the ownership of vehicles sore. At the end of 2018, ownership of motor vehicles in China reached 327 million units including 240 million automobiles, and accordingly there were up to 110,000 filling stations and at least 9,000 natural gas stations across the country, according to ResearchAndMarkets.com

In the Chinese filling station market, state-owned enterprises, private firms and foreign companies co-exist, among which the state-owned enterprises are represented by CNPC, Sinopec and CNOOC, which held a combined market share of approximately 52% in 2018, followed by private firms with 45% share and foreign companies less than 3% share.

In June 2018, regulations against foreign investment access were dropeed, which officially abolished the restriction that a foreign retailer in possession of over 30 sites should have shares controlled by a Chinese side. As a result, foreign companies like Shell and BP have stated ambitious expansion plans.

Shell is keen to operate 2,200 more filling stations in China by 2025; BP wants to add 1,000 filling stations in China over the next five years; Exxon Mobil and Total will follow suit and make their forays into the Chinese retailing market rapidly.

It is expected that in 2025 there will be a total increase of nearly 30,000 filling stations over 2018.

As its refined oil retailing market is fully opened up, China's reform of filling stations will usher in a new platform. With the prevalence of the filling station, plus convenience store, plus charging station/pile model, related companies actively collaborate on promotional pilots of charging/battery-swap services in filling stations.