Potentially Promising, Staff Of The Minister Of Energy And Mineral Resources Calls Still Needs Nickel Exploration

Nickel illustration (photo: dock. intermediate)

JAKARTA - Special Staff to the Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources for the Acceleration of Mineral and Coal Governance, Irwandy Arif, stated that nickel commodity reserves in Indonesia are still the largest in the world or the equivalent of 23 percent of reserves in the world.

"Total, Indonesia memiliki sumber daya nikel mencapai 17,7 miliar ton bijih dan 177,8 juta ton metal, dengan jumlah cadangan 5,2 miliar ton bijih dan 57 juta ton metal," ujar Irwandy kepada media, Kamis, 19 Oktober.

He added that there are several areas that have nickel content, but have not yet been explored (greenfield) spread across Southeast Sulawesi, Central Sulawesi, South Sulawesi, Maluku, North Maluku, Papua, and West Papua Provinces.

According to him, for the production of second class nickel, such as nickel pig iron (NPI) and ferronickel, they are estimated to be around 6 to 11 years old, but for class 1 nickel batteries, they are still around 25 to 112 years old.

"If we look at the current reserve of 5.2 billion tons, approximately the same amount between those who are competitive with limousines and then the resources are around 17 billion tons, now this is the resource that we must convert to reserves and detailed exploration efforts are needed," continued Irwandy.

To increase the number of reserves, he said, it is necessary to explore greenfield areas that are estimated to contain nickel.

According to Irwandy, this opportunity is still very open for those who will carry out nickel mining activities in Indonesia.

"So actually the age (nickel) earlier and the number of reserves and resources will increase if we activate this level of exploration. Well, of course, a lot of investment is needed. This is what needs to be done to increase the existing reserves," continued Irwandy.

In order to extend the life of nickel, it is necessary to reduce the rate of consumption of nickel ore. Including thinking about how NPI and ferronickel products can be processed as industrialization into stainless steel.

"This is what we need to encourage for those who have tried to have the Rotary Kiln Electric Furnace (RKEF) technology for the production of NPI and ferronickel. To provide this boost in the RKEF, NPI and ferronickel production will be sought to continue towards stainless steel to reduce nickel seed consumption upstream. This is very important for the balance of supply chains from our nickel," added Irwandy.

Based on the 2020 Nickel Mining Booklet, maps of the distribution of nickel resource and reserves outside the nickel IUP/KK area on Sulawesi Island in 2020 show that Southeast Sulawesi has 77 percent of the potential for mineralization carriers without a WIUP with a potential reserve of 2.6 billion tons.

Maluku, 43 percent of the potential areas for mineralizing carriers do not yet have WIUP and reserves of 1.4 billion tons, while for Papua the investment potential data is even more attractive, the potential for reserves is 0.06 billion tons with a potential area of mineralization carriers, there is no WIUP of 98 percent.

Looking at the large and promising areas of nickel greenfields with large reserves and opportunities for the nickel downstream industry that are still needed, Indonesia is an attractive choice for investment development in the nickel mining sector.