A new factory in Canada will bolster General Motor’s North American supply chain for battery parts. Alongside POSCO Chemical, a South Korean materials company, GM will build a plant in Quebec to produce cathode active material. The $400 million plant will supply the material to GM’s Ultium factories, where it will be used to make negative terminals once it becomes operational in 2024.
In a statement last December announcing the plant, GM executive VP Doug Parks said the joint venture with POSCO Chemical is key to scale U.S. production of electric vehicles and parts in North America. “We are building a sustainable and resilient North America-focused supply chain for EVs covering the entire ecosystem from raw materials to battery cell manufacturing and recycling,” said Parks.
The more recent statement, released March 7, confirms the plant’s location in Bécancour, Quebec, and that POSCO Chemical will have majority control over it. The new factory, Parks reiterated, will help create “a new, more secure and more sustainable ecosystem for EVs, built on a foundation of North American resources, technology and manufacturing expertise.”
The emphasis on sourcing battery materials in North America has taken on new import due to Russia, a major international supplier of nickel, and its ongoing invasion of Ukraine. According to EnergyTech, Canada is the largest nickel producer in the world outside of Asia and produces about 210,000 metric tons of the shiny metal every year.
Read more on this at EnergyTech, an IndustryWeek sister site.
