BASF, one of the most known chemical companies, announced a new battery materials production site in Schwarzheide, Germany, which will be able to support the upcoming EV battery gigafactories currently under construction.

The state-of-the-art facility is envisioned to produce high-nickel cathode active materials (CAM) with an initial capacity for around 400,000 battery packs for full electric vehicles per year. 400,000 initially suggests that it might be a lot more a later stage.

"The Schwarzheide plant’s modular design and infrastructure allows for the rapid scale-up of manufacturing capacities enabling BASF to meet increasing customer demand for the European EV market. The plant in Schwarzheide will use precursors (PCAM) from BASF’s previously announced plant in Harjavalta, Finland. Startup of the two plants is planned for 2022."

BASF intends to supply battery materials also from Harjavalta, Finland and plants in Asia and the U.S.

"With these investments in Finland and Germany, BASF will be the first CAM supplier with local production capacities in today’s three major markets – Asia, the U.S. and Europe. BASF will become the leading supplier with a reliable, sustainable and European-based supply chain which will comprise base metal supply, particularly nickel and cobalt, precursor production, and cathode material production within one region."

Dr. Peter Schuhmacher, President, Catalysts division at BASF