Premier Jacinta Allan unveils ‘ruthless’ plan for Victorian data centre dominance

Premier Jacinta Allan has “hit go” on a new mining project and created a bold plan to bring thousands of new AI jobs to Victoria, quoting US President Donald Trump on the value of critical minerals and rare earths.

Jacinta Allan has quoted Donald Trump while unveiling a “ruthless” new plan to tap Victoria into the global artificial intelligence gold rush.

In a bold bid to make Victoria the data centre capital of Australia, Ms Allan revealed on Thursday she had “hit go” on a new mining project and created a plan to bring thousands of new AI jobs to Victoria.

In a speech to top economists at a Committee for Economic Development of Australia (CEDA) event, Ms Allan said her government had formally approved an antimony exploration tunnel at Sunday Creek, near Broadford, allowing mining company Southern Cross Gold to drill underground to test the feasibility of mining gold and antimony.

Ms Allan has made a pitch to top economists to bring thousands of new AI jobs to Victoria. Picture: Michael Willson

Antimony is used in storage batteries and in the semiconductor industry, making it key to the Premier’s new mission to make Victoria the “‘data centre’ centre” of the nation.

An excited Ms Allan noted that even Mr Trump had spruiked Australia’s mining capabilities as he signed a critical minerals deal with Anthony Albanese to counter China earlier this year.

“Even Donald Trump said – from inside the West Wing: ‘Australia will have so much critical minerals and rare earths you won’t know what to do with them’,” she said.

“Victoria is home to globally significant deposits of critical minerals,” she continued.

“We have titanium, zirconium and rare earth elements.

“We have Australia’s largest antimony deposits and its only operating antimony

mine.

“And we know what to do with them.”

US President Donald Trump. Picture: Alex Brandon

Ms Allan said the critical mineral would be crucial as Victoria launches its bid to be the AI hub of Australia.

“We’re going after the data centre jobs,” she said.

“We’re going to be ruthless about it.”

“It will position Victoria as the national leader in data centre investment – unlocking projects in the pipeline that are worth up to $25 billion in potential capital expenditure.”

The ever-expanding centres, which include servers, firewalls, and storage systems, run 24/7 to ensure billions of internet users globally are given real-time connectivity to search engines and social media algorithms.

Earlier this year, Australia was revealed as one of the top data centre investment markets in the world. Picture: Getty Images

With the industry expected to be worth more than $584 billion by 2032, tech giants like Amazon, Google and Meta are investing in hyperscale data centres that require enough energy to power a small city.

Earlier this year, Australia was revealed as one of the top data centre investment markets in the world, with vast amounts of land available to build the mega data centres.

Currently Victoria has more than 40 of them, including in metropolitan Melbourne and on the city fringes.

Ms Allan said Victoria had the “land, energy and the talent” for the centres which she assured would be sustainability powered.

Concerns have been repeatedly raised about the amount of water used to power the data centres, with the mayors in Melbourne’s outer north fearing they could pose a threat to the region’s booming population.

Under the plan, local TAFEs would be geared up to create a pipeline of construction workers, operations workers and digital workers, and $8.1m would be used to move Victorians into AI roles to secure the thousands of people needed to build and man the centres.

Ms Allan says her government has formally approved an antimony exploration tunnel at Sunday Creek, near Broadford. Picture: Luis Enrique Ascui

“The jobs are there, ready to be taken up,” she said.

“We’ll provide tailored, intensive training to upskill digital professionals to

become AI specialists.”

“We’ll target the sectors where we can make the biggest difference, fast.

“And we’ll offer it to more than 1,300 workers who are most at risk.

“It’ll be our plan to put people first in a future with AI.”

Victoria Chamber Chief Executive Sally Curtain called the new antimony mining project an “important development for Victoria’s critical minerals sector”.

“Victoria has missed out on the resources boom that has powered Queensland and WA,” she said.

“Critical minerals and other resources give our state, and especially our regions, new revenue and investment potential that will create new jobs, new skills, higher living standards and generate economic prosperity.

“This approval is encouraging, but we need to see projects progressed at pace to capture these opportunities.”