Huali Nickel Indonesia, which is on target to start production in early 2027, will have a nameplate capacity of 60,000 t/yr nickel metal equivalent for nickel and 5,000 t/yr for cobalt with the MHP output, using the high-pressure acid leaching (HPAL) process. The MHP will be used to manufacture electric vehicle (EV) batteries.
The two firms signed an initial agreement to develop the project in September 2022. Huali shall sign a formal ore supply agreement with PTVI for limonite supplies from PTVI's Sorowako mine to ensure feedstock supplies to Huali's HPAL project, once PTVI completes the feasibility study on exploration of the mine.
Huayou has invested in another joint-venture project with PTVI and US auto producer Ford, also in Sulawesi, to produce MHP with 120,000 t/yr of nickel metal equivalent capacity with the cobalt capacity undisclosed. It will process ore provided by PTVI from its Pomalaa block mine, with completion scheduled for 2026.
Huayou has invested in a number of nickel and cobalt output projects in Indonesia to meet rapidly evolving demand from the EV battery industry chain and take advantage of Indonesia's abundant resources of key battery metals. Huayou's nickel shipments more than trebled from a year earlier to 53,700t in the first half of 2023.
It launched in December 2021 its first Indonesian project Huayue, jointly owned by Huayou and Chinese diversified metals mining producer CMOC and stainless steel firm Tsingshan, with a capacity of 60,000 t/yr nickel metal equivalent and 5,000 t/yr cobalt metal equivalent. It launched in June the second Huafei project in the Weda Bay industrial park in Indonesia's north Maluku, with a capacity of 120,000 t/yr nickel metal equivalent and 15,000 t/yr cobalt metal equivalent, using the hydrometallurgy process to produce intermediate feedstock MHP. It is also building the Huashan project in Indonesia with a nameplate capacity of 120,000 t/yr of nickel and 15,000 t/yr of cobalt, with it likely to launch in 2025. It also unveiled a plan in July for the Huaxiang Refining Indonesia project to produce nickel sulphate at Weda Bay with 50,000 t/yr metal equivalent of capacity.
Huayou shipped 46,000t of cathode active material in the first half of this year, including 40,900t of nickel-cobalt-manganese (NCM), up by 23pc from a year earlier. Its NCM shipments comprise 33,900t of high-nickel NCM, such as 8 and 9 series, accounting for 83pc of the total NCM sales. Its shipments of ternary precursors also increased by 42pc to 52,500t over the same period. Huayou's lithium cobalt oxide shipments were 520,000t, up by 1.18pc from a year earier, while its deliveries of cobalt products rose by 11pc to 20,500t.
