LG Chem will construct a battery anode material plant with an annual supply of 500,000 electric vehicles as its first business model for Gumi-style jobs. As the car battery market is expected to grow rapidly in the future, the company has taken a preemptive step in expanding the internalization rate of the anode material, a key raw material for batteries.
LG Chem said it signed an investment agreement with Gumi City, North Gyeongsang Province, on July 25 at Gumi Convention Center, which calls for the construction of a battery anode material plant by investing about 500 billion won on 60,000 square meters of land in the state-run industrial complex in Gumi.
The construction of the plant is expected to create more than 1,000 quality jobs, including direct and indirect. Anode material is one of the four key raw materials of the battery.
In particular, it is a high-value industry with high technology barriers as the most important raw material that accounts for about 40 percent of the cost of battery materials.
The new plant will begin construction sometime next year and will have an annual production capacity of about 60,000 tons after 2024, when the investment is completed. This is a size that can manufacture about 500,000 batteries based on high-performance pure electric vehicles (380 kilometers or more).
LG Chem expects that by establishing the anode material plant in Gumi along with the existing Cheongju and Iksan, it will contribute to expanding the proportion of internal supply and demand of key raw materials for batteries, establishing a stable supply chain, and strengthening competitiveness in costs.
LG Chem's accumulated order backlog for automotive batteries surpassed 110 trillion won at the end of March, and the order backlog is on the fast rise. It is expected that sales of its battery division will grow rapidly from 6.5 trillion won last year to 31.6 trillion won in 2024, focusing on its automotive battery business.