Quebec’s Northvolt project is officially dead — and the government says it is cutting its losses.
Christine Fréchette, Quebec’s economy minister, announced Tuesday that the province will invest no further money in Northvolt Batteries North America.
“The company’s failure to present a satisfactory plan with regard to Quebec’s interests has led us to assert our rights in order to recover as much of our investment as possible,” Fréchette’s said in a statement. “This venture proved unsuccessful, and we are obviously disappointed.”
The announcement spells the end to Northvolt’s highly touted, but controversial, plan to build a $7-billion plant in Saint-Basile-le-Grand and McMasterville in the Montérégie region. The Quebec government had supported the proposal and changed its own rules, allowing the project to bypass an environmental review.
Quebec had invested $510 million in the project, saying it would create 3,000 jobs in the area and make Quebec a battery producing powerhouse.
The investments included a $240-million guaranteed loan and a $270-million investment in Northvolt Batteries North America’s parent company.
Quebec officially lost that $270-million investment, Fréchette said in a news release. Northvolt declared bankruptcy in Sweden in March.
Fréchette insisted, however, that the province will recover the $240-million loan.
Quebec had allotted 352 megawatts of power to the project, and Fréchette said that energy will now be allocated elsewhere.
The Coalition Avenir Québec government has long touted the Northvolt plant as part of its “filière batterie,” or battery production, which intends to boost research, mineral development and battery production in the province.
Fréchette said the “filière batterie” was still in good shape, with several battery companies already establishing themselves in the province.
Another CAQ failure, opposition leaders say
Pablo Rodriguez, the leader of the Quebec Liberal Party, said his party had been warning the government for more than a year to be careful with how the Northvolt project was developing.
“It’s a failure. It means we put all our eggs in one basket,” he said. “I think it’s a failure on the planning level and on the execution level.”
Québec Solidaire spokesperson Ruba Ghazal cast doubt on the government’s ability to regain the money it had loaned.
“With Northvolt, François Legault promised us the project of the century. Instead, we are faced with yet another CAQ fiasco,” she wrote in a post on X.
“After hundreds of millions of dollars wasted by the CAQ, is there really any hope that Quebecers will ever see that money again? This is unacceptable.”
Parti Québécois MNA Pascal Paradis described the Northvolt project as another example of CAQ waste.
“What’s shocking is that this took so long,” he said. “What’s sad, in the end, is that this is hundreds of millions of dollars of Quebecers’ money that was wasted by the CAQ government in this project that was poorly planned, mismanaged and poorly negotiated.”
