Canada has the means to be a North American leader, but only if it acts now!
In the post-pandemic world, the battery industry will look for greater supply security. According to Simon Moores, managing director of Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, supply chains will shorten and localize within different continents. Canada has a chance to shape the ones in North America.
These production steps promise high-quality jobs and could improve our manufacturing strength.
Canadian raw materials need to be processed locally, instead of being sent to Asia. Our mining and refining industries need to build long-term relationships with battery manufacturers and automakers to secure stable supply contracts. Federal and provincial governments need to be the catalyst. An initiative of such scale and complexity will require large investments, tax incentives, and help with infrastructure.
China is currently building an equivalent of one medium-size battery factory a week, and Europe is building one every two months. Canada should no longer stay on the sidelines.
Canada has starting advantages that not many countries have:
1) The right resources — Lithium, Nickel and Cobalt, Manganese. The four main minerals and metals mined in Canada and used to make these products are cobalt, graphite, lithium and nickel. Quebec is the only province that is currently producing lithium and graphite, and is the largest supplier of cobalt. In 2018, Canada produced 3,500 tonnes of cobalt valued at $332 million.
2) Relevant processing and manufacturing know-how.
EV Relevance
GM, Ford (5 automobile models) and Fiat Chrysler building EV assembly lines in Ontario, Autohub in neighboring Michigan. Comparatively, according to Bloomberg, China is set to reach a production capacity of over 1,000 GWh and Europe over 300 GWh by 2025. That equals around 1,300 sizable production plants.
The International Energy Agency forecasts that by 2030, production of electric vehicles could reach 43 million units per year with production valued at more than US$567 billion.
Canadian Announcements:
The WindsorEssex Economic Development Corp. (WEEDC), a development corporation, is in the advanced stages of its bid with an undisclosed big-name international battery manufacturer to bring the $2-billion project, and an estimated 2,000 direct jobs, to the Southern Ontario city, says WEEDC executive director and president Stephen MacKenzie.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau confirmed the federal government would “absolutely” dedicate significant financial resources to the plant, similar to its recent commitments to General Motors, Ford and Stellantis (formerly Fiat Chrysler) — all three of which have announced EV projects in Ontario since September.
According to WEEDC the company considering the bid has indicated it would like its new plant to be up and running within the next two to three years.
E-One Moli EVP, Frank So
“In Canada we have cheaper utility costs compared to other parts of the world,” says So, in an interview with Electric Autonomy Canada. “We are close to the U.S., which is one of the major markets for manufacturing. With the free trade agreements, manufacturing in Canada can certainly be an advantage in terms of customs and duty charges versus importing goods from overseas. And the dollar is still quite weak, which is a good thing in terms of having manufacturing in Canada.”
The plant E-One Moli is considering for Canada would be capable of producing 90 to 100 million battery cells per year (for scale an electric vehicle contains roughly 4,500 cells), or one and a half gigawatt hours of power. That would make it the largest cell manufacturing plant in Canada.
Bottom Line
Nobody in Canada is making 250,000 batteries a year, which the next three to four years are going to be about. Are we going to help the Canadian battery industry, mines and processors prove scalability? Or are we going to miss this opportunity?
