State spending on strategic industries to surge 43% next year
By Kim Kwang-tae
SEOUL, Sept. 9 (Yonhap) — POSCO Chemical Co. said Thursday that it has acquired a 13 percent stake in Qingdao Zhongshuo New Energy Technology Co. for 4.9 billion won (US$4.2 million) in the latest move to secure a key material required to make anodes used for EV batteries.
The chemical unit of South Korean steel giant POSCO said it will begin to receive spherical graphite from the Chinese company in 2022, though it did not provide details.
Qingdao Zhongshuo New Energy Technology in Pingdu, a city in China’s eastern province of Shandong, has an annual production capacity of 25,000 tons of spherical graphite, a material needed in making anodes.
This photo, provided by POSCO Chemical Co., shows a plant being built by Qingdao Zhongshuo New Energy Technology Co. in Pingdu, a city in China’s eastern province of Shandong. (PHOTO NOT FOR SALE) (Yonhap)
An anode is a key material in a battery that preserves lithium coming from the cathode and generates electricity while releasing lithium.
A cathode is one source of lithium in a lithium-ion battery and is also a key component of electric vehicle batteries.
POSCO Chemical said it plans to boost its annual production capacity of anodes to 260,000 tons — which is enough to manufacture about 5.7 million electric vehicles equipped with 60 kilowatt-hour battery packs — by 2030 from the current 44,000 tons.
POSCO Group has been pushing to boost its EV business in recent years as part of a diversification strategy.
In July, POSCO Chemical announced a plan to invest about 600 billion won from 2022 to build a new cathode materials plant with an annual capacity of 60,000 tons in South Korea’s southeastern port of Pohang.
POSCO Chemical currently operates cathode materials plants in the southeastern industrial city of Gumi and in the southern port of Gwangyang.
The EV battery market has been on a roll as automakers around the world race to go electric and eco-friendly due to tightened regulations on greenhouse gas emissions, which scientists say are to blame for global warming.
In January, POSCO purchased a 15 percent stake in Black Rock Mining for $7.5 million in a deal that will pave the way for the steel giant to secure graphite fines, a material required to make anodes.
The Australia-based graphite producer has a 100 percent interest in the Mahenge Project in Tanzania, which hosts a multi-generational graphite resource.
entropy@yna.co.kr
(YONHAP NEWS)