Albemarle is mulling a sale of its Australind workers' village after the lithium giant scaled back its $2 billion expansion plan at Kemerton amid ongoing depressed prices.
US-based Albemarle Corporation today announced it has engaged real estate agent CBRE to manage a potential sales process of the Paris Grove village, which was set to house workers on Albemarle’s Kemerton lithium hydroxide processing plant.
It comes about a month after Albemarle announced the expansion of the Kemerton plan would not proceed because of the downturn in the lithium price.
In March 2023, a development assessment panel approved Albemarle’s $140 million proposal to build Paris Grove on a 17.3-hectare lot on Paris Road in Australind.
The approved Paris Grove village design could house up to 849 workers, with the current capacity being 386 people, Albemarle said.
Albemarle Capital Projects vice president Joshua Rowan said the company had worked hard to create a village of the highest standard.
“We undertook extensive stakeholder and community engagement including a comprehensive social impact assessment to ensure that the project was accepted by the local residential and business community,” he said.
“Based on that advice, we built an industry-leading accommodation village which will help take the pressure off the local housing market.
“Whilst it would have been ideal to realise the full benefit of Paris Grove ourselves, we cannot control the market, so there is now a potential opportunity for another company to take over this high-quality asset.”
In August, Albemarle announced it would shut down parts of its Kemerton lithium hydroxide operation, including stopping construction activities at the third processing train and putting train two unit into care and maintenance.
The move was estimated to impact 300 local jobs.
Albemarle also scrapped a $73 million workers' village proposal in Binningup, which was meant to house 500 staff working on the Kemerton plant, in June 2023.
At the time, Albemarle said it would focus on constructing its Paris Grove accommodation village.
