Chinese battery materials firm Guangdong Brunp Recycling Technology has begun building a lithium-ion battery cathode active material (CAM) plant in central China’s Hubei province.
The project aims to meet increased demand from the new energy vehicle (NEV) industry on battery makers including Contemporary Amperex Technology (CATL), which owns a 53% stake in Guangdong.
The 32-billion yuan ($4.9 billion) project will include production of 360,000 tonnes per year (t/yr) for iron phosphate; 220,000 t/yr for lithium iron phosphate (LFP); 180,000 t/yr for NCM precursor and NCM; 40,000 t/yr for lithium cobalt oxide (LCO); 40,000 t/yr for recycled graphite.
The first phase is expected to start production in 2023 and be completed two years later, with its CAM output sufficient to equip more than four million NEVs.
Guangdong Brunp has an output capacity of 100,000 t/yr for NCM precursor and 20,000 t/yr for NCM material.
It has previously invested in a high-pressure acid leaching project in Indonesia to produce mixed nickel-cobalt hydroxide precipitate, in partnership with Chinese cobalt refinery and battery material producer Green Eco-Manufacture (GEM) and domestic steel producer Tsingshan.
That project is scheduled to launch in the first quarter of next year with 50,000 t/yr capacity of nickel metal equivalent and 5,000 t/yr of cobalt metal equivalent.
Brunp also recycles cobalt/nickel/lithium scrap into raw materials.
