It has long been difficult to give statistics for the production and sales of China’s construction glass (except for flat glass), particularly for deep processed glass, such as tempered glass, hollow glass, filmed glass, laminated glass, colored glaze glass etc. This article aims at analyzing market development trend instead of looking for accurate data. The focus is based on comparison of data of different years collected by the same statistical means. In consideration of the state policy influence, this article educes the trend for construction glass as a reference for those concerned in the industry.
Market scale of China’s construction glass
Estimation of total market volume
Estimating glass consumption by the area of building completed each year, if the glass usable area is 20% of the floor area:
In 2003, the newly increased floor area is 1.8 billion sqm, while the estimated glass usable area shall be around 360 million sqm. Still more, estimated by the output of flat glass, the area of raw glass plates for buildings in 2003 was 520 million sqm, including those used for old house reconstruction. Considering the double consumption of compound products like hollow glass etc, the overall volume shall be about 360 million sqm, which is about the same with the above results.
Statistics of local high-end glass consumption in recent years
Statistics showed that in recent 5 years, annual growth rate of hollow glass consumption is above 40%, and over 13% for filmed glass (including low-E glass), which means that the growth rate of hollow glass is much higher than that of filmed glass. Consequently, it can be predicted that transparent hollow glass or colored hollow glass consumption will grow by wide margin.
Distribution of all grades of glass
In accordance with overall market volume and high-end glass consumption, the distribution of different grades of glass could be analyzed.
Analysis results showed that consumption of high-end glass accounts for only 3% of that of construction glass, while medium end glass consumption accounts for only 12%, meaning that low energy conservation glass is widely used in the majority of buildings.
Market demand for main products in 2007
According to the above statistics, and predicted by a moderate annual growth rate, the market volume for 2007 would be: transparent hollow glass consumption is over 50 million sqm, used mainly for residential houses. Regulated by the state issued Design Standard for Energy Conservation of Public Buildings on July 1st 2005, such kind of glass is restricted in public building projects except for remote regions and those difficult to control areas. By then the newly increased filmed glass (including low-E glass) consumption will be about 6 million sqm, used mainly for public construction projects, and partly used for residential buildings, which is equivalent to the output for 4 to 5 large filmed glass production lines.
Development trend of China’s construction glass market
User demand trend
With improvement of living standard, the requirement on buildings quality is also increased. Such requirement and expectations can be summarized as the following: energy efficient – can save heating and air conditioning expenses; comfortable – the glass has good sound insulation performance, sufficient light in the room, can insulate sun heat in summer and keep warmth in winter; high quality – nice physical form, stable and safe performance; reasonable price – affordable for most buildings. For affluent people, comfort is more important, but for the majority of common people, low price is still a decisive factor.
State energy conservation policies
China’s energy conservation target is: by 2010, 1/3 newly built buildings will reach the target of 50% energy conservation; by 2020, all newly built buildings will reach the target of 65% energy conservation. Based on the 2010 target, the area of newly built area is about 3 billion sqm, with 600 million sqm energy efficient glass, the annual increased glass is about 120 million sqm, with higher growth rate for hollow glass and low-E glass. The trend for hollow glass consumption, which will increase due to policy factors, is as follows:
Realization of rapid growth of energy efficient glass (hollow) depends on government supervision measures. Wu Yong, deputy director of technology department of Ministry of Construction, proposed that energy efficient building should make use of the existing organization structure, ensure strict control on design examination, project commencement permit, completion inspection and acceptance, and sales permit, and all procedures shall be assessed by professional organizations, those unqualified shall not have certificate granted. Qiu Baoxing, vice minister of Ministry of Construction pointed out at the state council press release in early 2006 that building design and construction companies that do not execute the energy efficient standards shall be punished or even be cleared out of the construction market, and Ministry of Construction will supervise the whole construction process. However, detailed supervision regulations still need to be improved.
Trend of glass varieties
Predicting from the distribution of existing types, there are two possibilities for the trend: first, all types of glass will increase evenly, which is obviously as a result of policy restrictions; second, the energy efficient type will increase under the energy efficiency policies.
Based on the growth mode of energy efficient type, hollow glass will have exceptionally high growth. The changing trends of specific glass types are: single transparent glass, currently accounting for 80% of the market share, will be replaced by glass of a higher standard; transparent hollow glass, annual growth rate is more than 40%, the growth rate after 2007 is expected to reach 60%, emerging as a mainstream growing product, which is also the basis for a higher level glass consumption; single piece filmed glass, restricted to be used for public buildings in less developed regions, so its consumption will decrease gradually; heat reflecting coated hollow glass, in public buildings, it will replace single filmed glass, and will grow to a certain degree, but its annual growth rate will decrease, and replaced by low-E hollow glass in the end; low-E glass, will be the first choice and mainstream product for public buildings, with lower production cost, it will also be widely used for residential buildings, replacing transparent hollow glass and colored hollow glass.
Development trend of China’s building glass
Existing advantages of China’s building glass production industry
China’s glass production industry has had considerable development in recent years, which is especially evident in technical development for deep processed glass, as enterprises introduce and upgrade production equipments, and some of the equipments are now home made etc, laying a foundation for the development of the whole glass industry. Currently there are 125 float glass production lines, with huge production capacity; for hollow glass, high level and medium level scaled production pattern has come into shape; for filmed glass, there is sufficient product capacity to meet market demand; in addition, production for all types of glass is well equipped, and raw materials and accessories for production are basically home made. In terms of technology, regarding hardware, China is equipped with production equipments that are in line with the world advanced standard; regarding software, there is leading-edge technique in the world. Consequently, China’s overall advantage is evident.
Status quo and existing problems
Despite of the overall production advantage, problems are also pressing. First, technical processing level varies a great deal, high quality products can be exported to the world market, whereas products of inferior quality cannot even meet state standards; second, scaled deep processed products are centralized in the public building field, there is a lack of boost for the market of energy efficient glass for residential houses, as leading enterprises have limited input in this regard; third, export volume of glass for high-end buildings is limited, without large scale export as yet.
Counter measures and development trend
In order to meet the need for the development of construction market development, the industrial association should provide a platform to strengthen technical exchange and cooperation among production enterprises, so as to improve production level of the whole industry, especially of small and medium enterprises. Speed up transfer of high-end energy efficient product – low-E hollow glass to the field of residential buildings, make use of the advantage of large glass production enterprises that are capable of large scale low-E glass production, and the advantage of small and medium glass processing enterprises that can produce large quantity of hollow glass, expand low-E hollow glass production by means of cooperation, reduce production cost and foster scale production by complementing each other, so as to speed up application of energy efficient glass to the field of residential buildings. In order to avoid disorderly competition on the domestic market, large glass production enterprises should sharpen their international competition edge so that high-end compound glass products can have access to the world market in large scale.