Battery plant to generate work
ONE of the key people behind the planned multimillion-dollar Townsville battery plant says the project will have huge spin-off benefits for the city.
The Imperium3 consortium, which includes Magnis Energy Technologies, is planned for Woodstock.
If it goes ahead, it will produce up to 50 million batteries each year.
The group will only produce the batteries and will need to source most of the raw materials from elsewhere.
Battery packs will not be made at Imperium3’s planned factory either.
Magnis managing director Marc Vogts said this project was a no-brainer not just for Townsville, but for Australia.
“This is not only going to go well for us producing batteries, it’s going to spiral out to a lot of allied industries,” he said.
“We make just the cell, someone is going to come along and want to make the battery packs.
“It can then be lifted up and put into a storage facility, it’s not simply put it into a box.”
The graphite in the batteries will come from a mine Magnis owns in Tanzania. However, other raw materials like nickel will be needed within the lithium ion batteries.
“We know Australia is blessed with a whole lot of raw materials and some of them are really well suited to battery production,” Mr Vogts said.
Although no specific companies have been engaged yet, Mr Vogts said there were opportunities to engage mining companies to supply material to Imperium3. It’s hoped a development application for the factory will be lodged within three months and on-theground work could start by the middle of 2020.
It would take about 2½ years to commission the plant.
There are expected to be up to 1000 operational jobs at the factory once it is built.
“We’re not doing this for show, we are doing this because it’s a strong business case,” Mr Vogts.
“We think this is a real win for Australia to have a plant of this scale.”
The plant would be 15GW; large in the scale of similar plants around the world.
Mr Vogts said there were specialists who would be engaged to make the precursor materials for the batteries.
“This is where it’s going to take other organisations with the initiative,” he said.
“You can say ‘why don’t we widen out?, but no, we should stick to what our core business is and attract others.”
Mr Vogts knows businesses are looking at the emerging battery metals sector.
“I’ve been in the mining business a long time, so I know that everyone is looking as to where the value point is where you drop off and get out,” Mr Vogts said.
“This is totally different because this is the new world we are entering.
“There is the demand for electrification and independence from the national grid and independence from fossil fuel. All these things are driving people to say this is a huge market for everybody to participate in.
“They are absolutely welcome to come and join us in this exciting business.”