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NICKEL REVIEW

Q A
&

Wa Minister of Mines Bill Johnston told
paydirt editor Dominic piper at the australian
Nickel Conference about his recent meetings
with battery supply chain customers in
Europe and North america.

: The State Government has opportunity to do processing of cathode- want to do processing engineering go to
Q made a big policy push making materials here in WA and whilst Perth because we actually know how to
towards downstream you don’t get any investments in that do that. We have a skilled workforce; we
processing and the battery space you do have people looking at have the experience of knowing what to
sector in the last 18 months. what options they have. If you further do in that space. This is about expanding
Are you still happy with process the material [here] you reduce capacity, we are not competing with
this decision? When will the transport costs, as you are not existing capacity because we are
the fruits of this policy be transporting a lower value material. The talking about 300-400% increases in
recognised? other thing is that you are securing a demand over the next 20 years as EVs
: Yes, we are happy and as second supply chain. Everyone knows and standing storage take off. This
that the dominant player is China and
investment has to happen. Given these
A government we can do a lot of this is a way that companies in Europe things are 30 years’ worth of investments
things; one thing we can do is help and North America can secure a second for a slightly higher capex because the
with land supply infrastructure, access supply chain. engineering still has to be done in Asia,
to ports and supporting training. The the capital cost is actually not that much
Future Battery Industry CRC is also higher. But, given you are going to be
another thing we support for R&D. : How is WA being promoted as a doing it for 30 years you have those
These are all genuine opportunities for Q jurisdiction to international other advantages. We can provide the
government to help industry. [In nickel] end-users? business case so people can make
we are interested in proposals from : Firstly, we are have demonstrated money and supply product at a cost that
IGO [Independence Group NL] and A capacity to support foreign their off-takers want.
others through the processing of nickel investment over a long period of time;
sulphate. that is absolutely critical. When you see
some countries change their policies : We have seen price spikes and
: WA has always been a supplier on a regular basis that does make it Q troughs in lithium, graphite
Q of raw materials, particularly to harder for people to judge where they and cobalt recently. Is the
the Asian market. How do you are going to invest. We have a high Government conscious of picking
market this downstream policy capacity to demonstrate our ethical certain winners and losers in
in Asia and elsewhere? supply capacity and that is becoming commodities for technologies?
Is there room to have a focus on
: I have only recently arrived increasingly important for end-users and nickel at one point?
A back after travelling to Europe and the Facebook generation. We have high
North America to, in part, promote our capacity to apply technology to solve : We’re trying to support people
future battery strategy and we received problems and the mining industry in WA A making investments so clearly
a very strong and positive response. is adept with that; if you want to be a the investors are the ones who make
People understand why there is an finance engineer go to New York, if you the decision about what is going to win

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