Indonesia Faces Deforestation Brought On by Nickel Industry Boom
Indonesia's nickel industry is rapidly expanding with rising demand for the heavy metal in electric vehicle batteries. But the process of mining and processing nickel has taken a huge toll on the country's rainforests.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00These smokestacks belong to just a few of the 27 nickel smelters in Indonesia.
00:06They sit at the heart of one of the world's largest nickel production facilities, Weta
00:11Bay.
00:12Nickel mining and processing have become one of Indonesia's main economic drivers.
00:17The country has the largest reserves of nickel globally, amounting to over 20 percent of
00:22the world's total, and has quickly expanded production capacity in the last decade.
00:27But the rapid growth of this industry has come at a steep environmental cost, as deposits
00:32of nickel sit close to the surface, right under the country's rainforests.
00:36The effect to the nature, particularly deforestation, and we found that since the smelter operates,
00:46the deforestation is higher, more than 200 percent.
00:51Indonesia has the world's third-largest rainforest-covered area, but that's quickly being depleted.
00:57NGO Global Forest Watch reports the country has lost around 740,000 square kilometers
01:02through logging, burning and degradation since 1950.
01:07And it's the communities closest to these deforested areas that are the first to feel
01:11the impact.
01:13Local farmer Librik Liha has been tending land near the Weta Bay Industrial Park for
01:17four decades.
01:19He says there's an orange dust coating its plants and floating in the air.
01:24It's also hard to get clean water due to recurring landslides thought to be caused
01:27by deforestation.
01:29He worries about how he and other farmers will fare in the future.
01:40But there seems to be no stopping Indonesia's nickel business.
01:44And as demand grows, so too does the incentive to exploit the country's natural advantage.
01:50In 2023, the country supplied more than half of the world's nickel ore, the raw material
01:55once used mainly to make stainless steel, now also a key element in producing electric
02:00vehicle batteries.
02:02Since 2014, the Indonesian government has pushed the country toward refining nickel
02:07for major international clients like Tesla.
02:20Indonesian officials plan to build 22 more smelters, along with multiple coal-fired power
02:27plants to keep them running.
02:29But with damage to the country's rainforest worsening, the pursuit of economic development
02:34may well come at the expense of the country's natural environment.
02:38Luvy Lee and Irene Lin for Taiwan Plus.