Drivers, page-4

Last year all the expansion talk on HC was around satellite refineries churning out Talnode C under customers rooves overseas but MT put a damper on that idea certainly in relation to the UK refinery proposal following the equipment cost blow out of several hundred million for the Lulea anode plant which we were told followed feedback from customers. Seems like most of the manufacturing cost is incurred in that final stage of production which involves spheronisation and coating. My take is that he was saying it makes more sense to produce all the AAM in Sweden and then ship it to customers rather than ship a partially refined product which then has to go through another $500m plus anode plant as would likely be the case in the UK and possibly elsewhere.

If that's true then the satellite refinery concept only makes sense if Sweden caps annual production of Talnode C at a figure well below what the market demands thus denying Talga the opportunity to supply finished product customers in continental Europe, USA, UK and Asia.

For non-EV applications who knows, maybe a dedicated refinery or two in Europe or Asia would be the go to service 3C and grid battery storage battery manufacturers like Fryer and Long Time Technology if the numbers stack up the right way.