The Chinese manufacturer’s proposal defines that CALB’s future lithium battery factory for electric cars will be located in the Sines Industrial and Logistics Zone.

The manufacturer China Aviation Lithium Battery Technology (CALB) has already started the environmental licensing process of the construction project of the Lithium Battery Unit, in Sines, in the district of Setúbal, for electric vehicles.

At the end of February, CALB presented to the Portuguese Environment Agency (APA) a Proposal for Definition of Scope (PDA) of the Environmental Impact Study (EIA), whose public consultation runs until 20 of this month, on the Participa portal, for the installation of the lithium battery industrial unit in Sines.

According to the APA, the phase of defining the scope of the EIA, which is prior to the evaluation process and is optional, “aims to identify, analyze and select the significant environmental aspects that may be affected by the project and on which the EIA should focus”.

The proposal, consulted by the Lusa agency, defines that CALB’s future lithium battery factory for electric cars will be located in the Industrial and Logistics Zone of Sines (ZILS), managed by aicep Global Parques.

“The project aims at the construction and operation of a lithium battery production unit, on land that is part of the Industrial and Logistics Zone of Sines (ZILS)”, in an area of 100 hectares, read in the document.

The land “identified for the lithium battery factory has about 100 hectares”, and the installation of the production unit is “expected”, which will have “a capacity of 15 Gwh [Gigawatts]”, in an area “of about 50 hectares”.

The factory will be built “using technology aimed at protecting the environment and complying with applicable environmental legislation, also with a view to building a low-carbon industrial unit,” he says.

The industrial unit will have “a ‘Leed/Bream’ type certification”, using “renewable energy sources”, “water reuse” and “waste recycling”.

In a statement to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange in November 2022, CALB revealed that it had signed a memorandum of understanding with a subsidiary of the Agency for Investment and Foreign Trade of Portugal (AICEP).

The agreement with aicep Global Parques included the acquisition of “surface rights, with the aim of setting up a world-class, highly intelligent, computerized and automated factory, with zero carbon emissions,” the company said.

CALB “has not yet signed a legally binding agreement”, so “the cooperation contemplated in the memorandum of understanding may or may not move forward,” he stressed.

In the memorandum of understanding, signed in November, in Sines, with aicep Global Parques, manager of ZILS, CALB demonstrated that this municipality on the Alentejo coast was “one of the privileged locations,” said, at the time, the mayor of Sines, Nuno Mascarenhas, in statements to the Lusa agency.

“Sines is one of the privileged locations for CALB, since we have all the conditions here, but it is only the first intention,” said the mayor at the time.

According to the China Automotive Power Battery Industry Innovation Alliance, an industrial association, CALB was in 2021 the third largest Chinese manufacturer of electric car batteries.

The production unit is “expected”, which will have a capacity of 15 Gwh [Gigawatts]