The Ministry of Investment stated that Indonesia is ready to mass produce electric vehicle (EV) batteries in April 2024.
The mass production will mark a new page in the history of the country’s automotive industry and signify the benefits of the downstreaming policy.
“Downstreaming is a way to create added value from abundant natural resources in Indonesia, one of which is nickel,” the ministry’s Special Staff, Tina Talisa, stated here on Saturday.
According to Talisa, mass production will be carried out through PT Hyundai LG Industry (HLI) Green Power, a joint venture company between South Korea’s Hyundai Motor Group and LG Energy Solution, which is based in Karawang, West Java.
She assessed that it will not only make Indonesia the first EV battery cell producer in Southeast Asia but also highlight the government’s commitment to supporting the national EV battery ecosystem development project.
Talisa also highlighted that the massive production of EV battery cells would make Indonesia the first country to produce EV battery cells in Southeast Asia to use the latest technology from LG.
This will also directly trigger an absorption of Indonesian young workers to become professional workers, thereby ultimately boosting the community’s economy.
President Director of PT HLI Green Power Hong Woo Pyoung highlighted HLI’s readiness to carry out mass production.
Pyoung stated that Indonesia’s EV battery industry would later be able to create young pioneer engineers who are capable of professionally creating electric car battery cells.
He affirmed that his side had trained Indonesian engineers for a year and said that the training would continue to be provided.
In the first phase, PT HLI received an investment of US$1.1 billion and has a production capacity of 10 gigawatts per hour (GWh) with 32.6 million battery cells that could be used to produce approximately 150 thousand electric vehicles. In the second phase, PT HLI plans to increase its production capacity to 20 GWh in 2025.—Antara
