Excerpt from *. ESR will need to get a wiggle on. China via Indo will shift tech with desperation being the mother of invention. Tech evolves so that laterites can be used for batteries not just stainless. Difficult to know exactly how it's looking but interesting as is the shift from critical minerals. "If" CD and Team can find world class hit(s) then sky literally the limit. Watching both these spaces and passing time waiting for a headlining Ann!
"We’ve seen the projections for nickel that we might need a million tons of extra nickel metal for batteries over the next 10 years. The commentary from a lot of the Australian producers is about the advantage of nickel sulphides, but the reality is there’s not that much out there. Will the world have to turn to Indonesia for nickel for batteries?
“Absolutely and it’s already started. I mean, you’ve got LG and other groups that have broken ground on billion dollar battery plants.“And there are many others that are already in planning. So it will become an electric vehicle battery hub. You have the first HPAL which has been successfully commissioned (by Tsingshan), or three out of the four trains.“That started construction in March of 2020, when COVID first kicked off and they commissioned their first line in November of 2021. You just wouldn’t see that project execution of a HPAL that produces 60,000 tons of nickel in MHP and 8000-12,000 tons of cobalt anywhere else in the world.“And we believe the commissioning is going smoothly, that should be ramped up second half of next year. Once that’s, which I think it’s looking like it will be, I think you’ll see significant growth in HPAL plants in Indonesia producing an MHP perfect for the electric vehicle battery market.“So I think you’ll see increasingly, the nickel and cobalt sulphate coming from laterite sources rather than sulphide.”
ESR Price at posting:
3.2¢ Sentiment: Buy Disclosure: Held
