POSCO Chemical builds world’s largest cathode materials factory
POSCO Chemical held a ceremony on Thursday to celebrate the construction of its cathode materials factory in Gwangyang, South Jeolla Province, which can annually produce up to 90,000 tons of the core material for electric vehicle (EV) batteries.
“By establishing the production base equipped with the world’s largest production capacity and the world’s leading technologies, we have been able to brace for the rapidly growing market demand,” POSCO Chemical CEO Min Kyung-zoon said. “Based on this, we will accelerate our global investments, securing growth engines continuously.”
The construction has enabled the factory to increase its annual production capacity from 30,000 tons to 90,000 tons — the largest production capacity for a single cathode materials factory. According to POSCO Chemical, its annual production capacity is equivalent to the amount of cathode materials needed to produce batteries for 1 million high-performance EVs.
The company said the factory will specialize in producing high-nickel NCMA (nickel, cobalt, manganese and aluminum) and NCM (nickel, cobalt and manganese) to be used for global battery makers and carmakers.
Even before this latest construction project, the chemical firm had annually produced 10,000 tons of cathode materials in Gumi, North Gyeongsang Province, and 5,000 tons in China. The company has therefore increased its entire annual cathode materials production capacity to 105,000 tons.
In addition, it plans to build additional factories in Pohang, North Gyeongsang Province, as well as in China and Canada. They will collectively increase the annual production capacity by 120,000 tons.
POSCO Chemical said these plans are intended to help the company better cope with the changing market environment and customer demands.
Emulating the Gwangyang factory, the company seeks to increase its entire cathode material production capacity to 340,000 tons by 2025 and 610,000 tons by 2030. It will also focus on R&D, so as to become one of the world’s top-tier battery materials producers.
In addition, POSCO Group has built a battery material value chain cluster near the chemical unit’s Gwangyang factory, in order to produce raw materials, intermediary materials and cathode materials in the same place.
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We will accelerate our global investments, securing growth engines continuously.
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