Finnish Minerals Group (FMG) has signed a memorandum of understanding with a potential partner to build a battery cell production plant in Finland. Its battery business company, Finnish Battery Chemicals, is preparing an environmental impact assessment (EIA).
The potential partner has not been named.
Two options to be assessed in the EIA are based on 27 GWh and 40 GWh total capacity per year, said FMG. It said in cell plant projects, the investment cost of a 10 GWh capacity is typically around €1 billion ($1.1 billion).
FMG manages the Finnish state’s mining industry holdings develops the Finnish value chain of lithium-ion batteries.
Matti Hietanen, CEO of FMG, said: “We have for some time now held discussions with our technology partner about the cell investment that would be located in Kotka. Although our partner has not yet made the final decision on the location of its next cell plant, we are strongly motivated to work to get the investment here. This is the right time to start looking at the plant’s environmental impact and ensure the conditions for the implementation of the project.”
The City of Kotka has offered an area of approximately 140 hectares for the project from the Keltakallio industrial area. The location is next to the cathode active material plant already planned for the same area.
Last week, Indian-owned company Epsilon Advanced Materials and Finnish Battery Chemicals, a project company of FMG, submitted an EIA programme concerning an anode material plant planned for Vaasa to the government authorities.
There are two options, with capacities of 10,000 tonnes and 50,000 tonnes of graphite-based anode material per year respectively.
