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Eramet-BASF's $2.6b investment plan only delayed, minister claims
The investment minister says the French-German nickel-cobalt refining project in Weda Bay has been merely postponed due to the current condition of the global EV market, contradicting statements released earlier this week from a coordinating minister's office and both Eramet and BASF that the joint investment project had indeed been canceled.
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Patches of forested areas dot cleared land on May 14, 2023 at the construction site of PT Indonesia Morowali Industrial Park (IMIP) in North Konawe, Central Sulawesi, one of the country’s largest nickel producers. (AFP/Riza Salman)
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nvestment Minister Bahlil Lahadalia said the plan of France’s Eramet and Germany’s BASF to invest US$2.6 billion into developing a nickel ore processing plant in North Maluku, had been merely postponed due to declining growth of electric vehicle (EV) sales in Europe.
“The [EV] market is slowing down, so they want to hit the brakes. So [the planned investment] is not canceled, it’s postponed,” the minister said on Thursday in Gresik, East Java, as quoted by Bisnis.com.
Bahlil said he expected the issue to persist until the climate improved for the highly competitive global EV market, where relatively cheap Chinese EV exports has been causing headaches for European and American carmakers.
In January 2023, the government announced that the French mining and metals giant and the German chemical company were close to finalizing an investment deal to produce mixed hydroxide precipitate (MHP), a key product used in EV batteries, by building a high-pressure acid leach (HPAL) nickel ore processing plant in Indonesia.
Eramet later confirmed that negotiations were underway on the project, subject to a final investment decision.
Read also: BASF, Eramet near $2.6 B Indonesia deal to process nickel for EV batteries
In a statement issued on Monday however, BASF announced that the two companies had decided not to proceed with the nickel-cobalt refining project in North Maluku’s Weda Bay.
