Asahi Kasei postpones Canada battery plant as Honda defers EV plans

GlobalData

Wed, April 15, 2026 astatine 6:08 AM CDT 2 min read

Asahi Kasei volition propulsion backmost the start-up of its Canada artillery materials works to 2029 oregon aboriginal aft Honda Motor deferred its Ontario EV plans, Nikkei Asia has reported.

The Japanese materials supplier is gathering the installation successful Ontario to marque artillery separators, a halfway constituent utilized successful lithium-ion batteries.

Asahi Kasei unveiled the task successful April 2024, with operations initially targeted for mid-2027.

The works was designed to person an yearly accumulation capableness of astir 700 cardinal quadrate meters -- equivalent to batteries for astir 1 cardinal EVs.

Honda holds a 25% involvement successful the project.

Honda’s timetable displacement has affected request assumptions for the plant. In May past year, Honda said it would enactment backmost the commencement of operations astatine its projected Ontario EV works by 2 years, moving the docket retired from 2028.

Nikkei Asia besides reported that request from different customers has weakened due to the fact that of the EV slowdown.

Against this backdrop, Asahi Kasei concluded it would beryllium hard to motorboat the separators works arsenic antecedently scheduled successful 2027.

The institution has lowered its North American EV marketplace forecast for 2030 to astir 2 cardinal vehicles, down from 8 million, and plans to set proviso operations to lucifer the slower ramp-up.

For now, Asahi Kasei plans to proviso the North American marketplace by exporting separators from Japan.

It is besides seeking to physique request tied to the expanding marketplace for artificial quality information centres successful an effort to bring the Canadian works online sooner.

Separately, a coating installation successful the US is inactive expected to statesman operations successful the archetypal fractional of fiscal 2026, successful enactment with the archetypal plan.

"Asahi Kasei postpones Canada artillery works arsenic Honda defers EV plans" was primitively created and published by Just Auto, a GlobalData owned brand.