What’s happening in Indonesia?

6 January 20244 months ago babelfish

Indonesia is paying part of the price of Europe's ecological transition with the deterioration of living conditions of workers in the nickel industry and damage to the environment. Report's investigation (Rai3) and Armaroli's criticisms (Cnr)

The European Green Deal is Europe's industrial and economic revolution through which the Old Continent wants to reduce its environmental footprint and change the production structure

The Green deal has three objectives:

55% reduction in car emissions by 2030
50% reduction in van emissions by 2030
0 emissions from new cars by 2035

In the energy transition, in the gradual abandonment of fossil fuels, in the reduction of emissions and in the transition to electric cars, a central role is played by batteries through which energy is accumulated and then distributed. Part of the latest episode of Report, the Rai3 in-depth program entitled Green hypocrisy , is dedicated to this topic.

GREEN BATTERIES THAT USE POLLUTING NICKEL

The batteries used by electric cars are made with nickel, lithium, cobalt and copper. European car manufacturers purchase batteries from China and Korea which, however, do not produce them in full. Asian countries assemble the batteries and purchase the refined raw materials from those countries, such as Indonesia, where labor is cheaper and environmental protection regulations are, to put it mildly, less stringent. In 2020, the Indonesian government made the decision to no longer export nickel, of which it is the leading producer in the world and which accounts for 10% in the preparation of batteries, but to produce batteries internally, developing the national industry and employment. But then. Suddenly something went wrong.

THE MOROWALI DISTRICT IN INDONESIA THAT POLLUTES AND PRODUCES "GREEN" BATTERIES FOR WESTERN COMPANIES

The Report journalists flew to Indonesia, to Morowali, to visit IMIP , a gigantic industrial district worth 15 billion dollars, created in partnership with a Chinese company, Tsingshan, where the entire nickel production chain takes place: from extraction, refining, semi-finished products. The entire global automotive industry gets part of its nickel here for electric car batteries: from Tesla to Stellantis , from Mercedes to Volkswagen to Chinese brands. IMIP , thanks to massive deforestation, covers more than 3000 hectares. “In September 2023, the area of nickel operations in Indonesia reached almost one million hectares – says Arie Rompas, of Greenpeace Indonesia -, with 362 licenses. For nickel reserves yet to be explored. We discovered that another 600 thousand hectares of virgin forest will be deforested, a frightening figure. It means that nickel processing, in addition to producing very high emissions, will also destroy the biodiversity of the region."

178 MILLION TONS OF NICKEL MINED IN INDONESIA IN 2022

Indonesian nickel, also due to the war in Ukraine, has increased its diffusion, also because it costs less. Heading the Association of Nickel Mining Industries in Indonesia is general secretary Meidy Katrin Lengkey. “This year we extracted 178 million tons of raw mineral – says the secretary -. We have another company that is building a new factory and another that is designing it. The national target is 467 million tons, you can imagine it." The energy to extract battery minerals, Report points out, is all coal.

In 2013, Indonesia emitted 164 million tonnes of CO2 from coal alone, Report highlights, the mining boom has doubled emissions to 303 million tonnes. Every ton of nickel produced in Indonesia emits 58 tons of carbon dioxide, well above the global average. “It's true, it seems counterintuitive. Green cars produced with coal energy – says general secretary Meidy Katrin Lengkey -. You would like us to go to solar panels but imagine that we have 177 production lines that require a lot of energy and we have a lot of coal, so we use that, we can't import energy."

NICKEL POLLUTION IN INDONESIA

The result is that pollution in the surroundings of the district has serious impacts on the environment, air and water, and on the health of the inhabitants. To refine nickel, 10 plants have been launched that use the high-pressure acid leaching method "which consists of treating the raw rocks with sulfuric acid at temperatures of 255° and very high pressure". For every ton of nickel processed, approximately 1.5 tons of hazardous waste is produced. “We want to make sure the world has enough supplies of nickel, both for steel and for electric vehicles – said Deputy Minister of Investments and Mining, Septian Hario Seto -. We have decided to process the nickel here and then sell it on the market, we will have more jobs, more economic development, more wealth for everyone. It's true, we have a pollution problem, but it's not true that we're doing nothing. We have given companies until the end of this year to improve the situation. Anyone who does not comply will close the plant. If a company does not have adequate management of the toxic residue, we will not issue the permit for the establishment"

DAMAGE TO THE ENVIRONMENT AND TO THE HEALTH OF WORKERS IN THE IMIP DISTRICT

The open-air toxic waste storage area of the IMIP giant alone today covers 600 hectares. “It is unlikely that rain and wind do not spread chemical residues into waterways and groundwater,” comments Cataldo Cicolella. Pollution is making the fishing economy difficult which, until some time ago, was the city's main source of economic supply. And the living conditions of IMIP workers are also precarious. “The workers – says Cataldo Cicolella – live in dirty, crowded barracks, in small rooms, with toilets that flow directly into open-air sewers”. Respiratory problems are commonplace. “The working conditions are terrible. Work shifts can last up to 12 hours a day and the factory lacks protection and safety systems, despite the company's millionaire profits." Report journalists have collected testimonies from IMIP workers who say they are spied on by the company, that they risk their jobs if they speak to journalists and that they cannot report accidents inside the factory.

FROM TESLA TO MERCEDES: ALL THE COMPANIES THAT DO BUSINESS WITH IMIP

There are many Western companies that do business with Indonesia. Elon Musk is in discussions with the Indonesian government to open a factory there. “It's true, I can confirm, he wants to make investments in Indonesia, we've been talking about it for more than a year and a half – said the deputy minister of investments and mines, Septian Hario Seto -. Tesla already buys nickel from us through its supplier, if he now wants to come and open his own factory, we obviously welcome him."

But not only Tesla, Stellantis also collaborates with Indonesia, like BMW, Volkswagen and Mercedes. “We don't hide anything from anyone, there is maximum transparency here – says general secretary Meidy Katrin Lengkey -. All Western investors know well how nickel is extracted here and how the subsequent processing is carried out. The managers have already been to check, they know well where what arrives in your countries comes from. You do green marketing and maybe someone has to hide something. The main thing is to say that the evaluation of the battery production cycle is green, there is no need to reveal the details of each stage of processing to the market, otherwise someone will say that the brand of that company is dirty, but for this there are teams that do the marketing."

PROFESSOR'S CRITICISM NICOLA ARMAROLI (CNR) AT THE REPORT INVESTIGATION

Not everyone liked Report's reportage. Prof. was very critical . Nicola Armaroli , researcher at the CNR and since 2014 has been director of Sapere, a scientific dissemination magazine. “I have been collaborating with REPORT-RAI3 for over 20 years, I have always worked with great professionals. It is precisely for this reason that the superficiality of the 'Green Hypocrisy' investigation of November 19th left me astonished. Some points,”wrote the professor. Armaroli on Linkedin . “The heart of the investigation is the trip to the Indonesian nickel mining districts, where an environmental disaster was documented, attributed exclusively to the boom in electric cars. It is NEVER said, in over an hour of reporting, that more than 90% of nickel is used by the metallurgical industry, in particular to produce stainless steel, a material that is found massively everywhere (including thermal cars…). The question is: does the journalist Giulio Valesini know and remain silent, or is he ignorant? In an investigation into 'hypocrisy', the 'detail' of the end uses of nickel could not and should not be ignored.”

But the professor's complaints do not stop at this consideration and underline the alleged "bad taste" of the investigation which tries to compare a tragic accident "in which a colleague from the CNR of Naples and a graduate student who was traveling with her on a prototype died of thermal car to be hybridized. Let's be clear, a journalistic investigation into that absurd tragedy is welcome, but the unjustified exaggeration of the causes of the disaster literally leaves one speechless." The speech of the prof. Armaroli ends on a note of regret and distrust. “We welcome investigations into the mining industry. However, wanting to show at all costs that the absolute evil of a very vast sector (and ALWAYS very impactful…) is the ecological transition, produces a grotesque result. This investigation undermined the credibility and authority of a historic public service broadcast. It's not good news."

This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/energia/estrazione-nichel-economia-indonesia/ on Sat, 06 Jan 2024 07:29:37 +0000.