Indonesia Will Control New Nickel Smelters To Prevent Nickel Oversupply

Menko Marves Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan emphasized that the government will control the construction of new processing and refining facilities (smelters) or increase the capacity of existing smelters to avoid oversupply of nickel in the market. He explained that currently operating smelter projects in Indonesia produce 1.8 million tons of nickel metal per year.

The capacity of the smelter under construction will increase the output of nickel metal by about 1 million tons per year, and the projects in the planning stage will increase the output of nickel metal by about 1.5 million tons per year. If all these projects are completed and put into operation, it is expected that the annual output of nickel metal in Indonesian smelters will reach 4.31 million tons in the next few years.

"The expansion of nickel smelter capacity must be controlled in the future to prevent oversupply in the market and shorten the life of reserves," he said at a conference in Jakarta, Indonesia on Tuesday (July 25, 2023). Therefore, he said, “All parties, especially entrepreneurs, must abide by Indonesian regulations, especially in the four areas of labor, technology transfer, environmental sustainability and increasing industrial added value. They have to comply with this, if investors do not comply, then we will stop the operation of RI (Resource Innovation).”