Northern Graphite is banking on the restart of the Okanjande Project in Namibia to fulfil the demands of a N$34.5 million German-funded research and development programme.
This is the second deal Northern Graphite has signed after the US$200 million (about N$3.76 billion) agreement with Saudi Arabia’s Al Obeikan Group for Investment Company, announced last month, which provides for the development of a large-scale battery anode material plant in Yanbu Industrial City.
Canada-based Northern Graphite Corporation is participating in USE-G: Environmentally Friendly and Safe Graphite Extraction for Europe’s Battery Industry, a three-year initiative backed by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy, which is contributing €1.14 million, or roughly N$23.1 million, toward a total project budget of €1.70 million (about N$34.5 million).
The programme brings together Northern Graphite, Rain Carbon Germany GmbH, H.C. Starck Tungsten GmbH, and Friedrich Schiller University Jena.
For Namibia, the strategic relevance lies in plans to supply natural graphite from a producing Canadian mine and, subject to restart, from Okanjande near Otjiwarongo, which has been on care and maintenance since 2018.
Long positioned as a battery-grade graphite asset, Okanjande’s inclusion in USE-G places it within a European-controlled processing, testing and recycling framework rather than a China-centric supply chain.
Graphite accounts for as much as 40% of the active material in a lithium-ion battery anode, yet Europe remains heavily dependent on China for purification, shaping and coating technologies. USE-G aims to change this by developing cleaner, less energy-intensive routes that avoid hydrofluoric acid, reduce energy use and incorporate recycled graphite recovered from spent batteries.
Under the programme, Northern Graphite will undertake milling, shaping and battery performance testing at its German laboratory.
In parallel, H.C. Starck Tungsten will apply proprietary technology to extract graphite from battery “black mass”, a material typically destroyed in conventional recycling processes.
Friedrich Schiller University Jena will lead research into chlorine-gas-based purification as a cleaner alternative to hydrofluoric acid and a less energy-intensive option than thermal purification.
Once purified, material will be processed by Rain Carbon Germany at its Duisburg and Castrop-Rauxel facilities, where advanced carbon coatings are developed for battery anodes.
Alongside the European programme, the Saudi agreement provides for a joint-venture anode plant, 51% owned by Al Obeikan and 49% by Northern Graphite. Construction is expected to begin in 2026, with first-phase production targeted for 2028 and an initial capacity of 25,000 tonnes per year, scalable as global demand grows.
The Saudi deal secures a long-term downstream outlet for Okanjande, with plans to offtake up to 50,000 tonnes per year of graphite concentrate once operations resume.
Together, the N$34.5 million German R&D programme and the N$3.76 billion Saudi downstream investment position Okanjande as a pivotal upstream asset linking Europe’s push for cleaner, independent battery materials with the Middle East’s ambition to build large-scale anode manufacturing capacity, sharpening the strategic case for restarting the Namibian project.
