"Nickel Unearthed: The Human and Climate Costs of Indonesia's Nickel Industry", January 2024

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This report documents the environmental and human impacts of IWIP, a huge nickel smelting and processing project, and surrounding nickel mines in Halmahera. The construction and operation of IWIP and upstream nickel mining has devastated the lives of many Indigenous Peoples and other rural community members, like Max and Maklon, and caused significant harms to the local environment and global climate. 

Climate Rights International interviewed 45 people living near nickel mining and smelting operations who described serious threats to their land rights, rights to practice their traditional ways of life, right to access clean water, and right to health due to the mining and smelting activities at IWIP and nearby nickel mining areas. Some companies, in coordination with Indonesian police and military personnel, have engaged in land grabbing, coercion, and intimidation of Indigenous Peoples and other communities, who are experiencing serious and potentially existential threats to their traditional ways of life.

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IWIP and other industrial parks in Indonesia are largely harnessing energy from captive coal plants, meaning that the coal burned directly feeds industrial operations and does not connect to the electricity grid. They are not accounted for in the country’s report to the Just Energy Transition Partnership, in which the government’s stated goal is for renewable energy to account for 44 percent of the national electricity mix by 2030.

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...Coal consumption in Indonesia increased a whopping 33 percent from 2021 to 2022,contributing to a 20.3 percent increase in the country’s greenhouse gas emissions in just one year.

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[Note: Companies cited in the report are: BASF, CNGR, Eramet, EVE Energy, Ford, Glaucous International Pte Ltd, Huayou Cobalt, Indonesia Weda Bay Industrial Park (IWIP), Lindo Investment Pte Ltd, Nickel Industries, POSCO, PT Antam, PT First Pacific Mining, PT Mega Haltim Minera, PT Weda Bay Nickel, Rigqueza International, Strive Investment, Tesla, Thiess, Tsingshan Holding Group, Volkswagen and Zhenshi Holding Group.]