Advance Cairns Roadmap 2035: The Far North industries in global demand
Far North Queensland possesses “critical” resources the world desires – hear from bosses of three locally-operating companies set to meet global demand.
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Far North Queensland possesses resources the world desires – that was the message to a sellout event in Cairns during a presentation on the region’s emerging and growing sectors.
Advance Cairns launched its Roadmap 2035 strategy at the Cairns Convention Centre on Friday, underpinned by the key motive of ensuring the Far North was recognised as more than a tourism destination.
Elected officials, business identities and community leaders heard from the bosses of three locally-operating businesses, either producing or set to produce goods currently in global demand and often “challenging” to substitute – placing the region at an advantage.
It included Silica Resources Australia’s executive chairman Peter Lansom who spoke about the Mourilyan Silica Sands Project – a mining operation set to start in 2028, expected to extract what he described as one of the “purest” deposits in the world.
The deposit located near Kurrimine Beach would be exported via the Mourilyan Port – which primarily is used as a sugar port.
“The deposit there is quite unique, we’ve done a lot of exploration over the last three or four years and that project has a built up reserve of we’re thinking 50 million tonnes,” Mr Lansom said.
“It’s a fine grade silica, because it’s made with wind deposit, and it gets washed for thousands of years in one of the wettest parts of the world. That’s created a very high purity product.
“In terms of silica, it is classified as a critical mineral, but is a very difficult mineral to access by mining, the reason being most of the silica deposits in the world sit on national parks and cannot be accessed.
“We’re very fortunate, we don’t have to do much to it – we dig it out of the ground at 99 per cent (purity) and then processing it hopefully to 99.5 to 99.9 per cent.”
Mr Lansom said he expected the company to help boost the Cassowary Coast’s economy by attracting current FIFO workers to a local opportunity, as well as upgrades to the Mourilyan Port.
Adam Douglas, industrial manager at Jet Zero – a sustainable aviation fuel manufacturer which is establishing its plant at Townsville – said the emerging industry led by a global demand for decarbonisation would help diversify North Queensland’s sugar industry.
SAF which is created from renewable biomass sources is becoming increasingly self-mandated across the aviation sector.
“In 30 years going up and down the Queensland coast in the sugar industry, I’ve seen these small towns are really struggling,” he said.
“We’ve partnered with Airbus and Qantas, who put their money where their mouth is and they take this aviation fuel on. We’ll also be supplying here to Cairns Airport.”
EQ Resources which operates a tungsten mine at Mount Carbine had grown from about 10 people to 150 in its six years of operation.
Operations manager Ryan MacNeill said the critical mineral was used significantly in defence industries, however most of the western world had depleted its stocks, creating a reliance on China.
“China controls 83 per cent of the world’s tungsten, so the west is starting to get pretty scared about it now.
“The west has depleted most of their strategic stocks, the US has stopped reporting because it’s stocks have gotten so low.
“Obviously war is never a good thing, but sovereign independence in critical minerals supply is important.”
Advance Cairns chief executive Jacinta Reddan said the not many people “understand or know” just how much there is to the Far North beyond tourism.
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Originally published as Advance Cairns Roadmap 2035: The Far North industries in global demand
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