The Land and Environmental Court rules that Senior Materials' application is too incomplete to be able to assess whether the company should receive an exemption to use the poison.
The court also believes that the Swedish Chemicals Agency did not fully investigate the matter before the authority decided on an exemption last autumn.
Large protests have taken place in Eskilstuna against the plans for the production, and even the municipality has questioned the operation when the scale of production became known, after initially welcoming the venture and the job opportunities.
Senior Material manufactures separator film, an important component for lithium batteries used in electric cars, among other things. It is prohibited in Sweden to use methylene chloride, a toxic chemical needed for production. Therefore, an exemption is needed, which the Swedish Chemicals Agency granted in September of this year.
But the Land and Environmental Court of Appeal stopped the operation in a decision on inhibition on December 10. Now the Land and Environmental Court is sending the case back to the Chemicals Inspectorate for a new hearing,
"The Chemicals Inspectorate must now review the dispensary case with new processing and a new decision. A case that has been referred back must be processed urgently," says the court's chairman, Councillor Inge Karlström, in a press release.
