NT mining: Resource exploration increases as NT mines shut down

Good news in resource exploration isn’t being matched by a thriving mining industry for the Northern Territory. Read why there’s a difference.

The NT government has defended the Territory’s track record of attracting mining investment despite our newest mine closing after less than a year.

Releasing new minerals exploration data in Darwin on Tuesday, Mining Minister Mark Monaghan also stood by the government’s new mining royalties legislation it introduced to Parliament last week despite industry criticism of aspects of the plan.

In 2023 exploration companies spent $228.4m in the Territory, a 14 per cent increase on the previous year and only marginally behind the 2011 record of $228.4m.

But the reality is exploration doesn’t automatically generate new mines and despite more than a century of mining in the NT, we currently have just eight mines, of which two are currently mothballed.

This is compared to about 125 mines in Western Australia.

Ian Scrimgeour, senior executive director with the NT Geological Survey, with a lump of lithium (left) and rare earth.

“As you know mines, their minerals and their commodities are at the whim of share prices and the ASX and the market tensions and they’re still operating at the moment, all of them,” Mr Monaghan said.

“The other thing we’ve found recently, and everybody’s aware of, is the weather – they’re impacted by a lot of things in their production.”

He shrugged-off an assertion by the Minerals Council NT that to be competitive, the Territory’s royalty settings should be equal to or greater than Western Australia’s.

Under the government’s new ad valorem royalties regime, the royalty rate applied to gold will be between 5 and 7.5 per cent, dependent on processing compared with a flat royalty rate of 2.5 per cent for gold in WA.

“That’s one of the minerals and one of the components, they’re very happy across the board with the changes that have been made.”

Mr Monaghan also brushed away concerns about the relative cost of accessing infrastructure including rail and port facilities across the Territory.

Core lithium’s direct shipping ore being loaded at Darwin Port.

“From what I’ve been told by a number of those prospective companies, they’re much happier with the ad valorem system we brought in recently,” he said.

“Ensuring the variety of rates, particularly the smaller miners where they actually look to downstream manufacturing who value ad, they’re very happy in that space.”

“(Gold) is one of the minerals and one of the components. They’re very happy across the board with the changes that have been made.”

A request by the NT News to speak with the so-called “happy” miners was brushed away.

Minerals Council NT has also raised concerns that the true transportation costs in the Territory are not properly represented by the new regime, the impact of grandfathering existing mines and the ongoing impacts of red tape on the sector.

The Territory currently claims eight operating mines, despite Elmore’s Peko magnetite mine near Tennant Creek being in voluntary administration and Core's Finniss Lithium mine both suspending operations at the beginning of the year.

The six still operational mines are Newmont’s Tanami gold mine, McArthur River zinc, lead and silver mine, Groote Eylandt manganese mine, Rio Tinto’s Gove bauxite mine, the Sill 80 ilmenite mine about 100km east of Mataranka, and the Dhupuma Plateau bauxite mine near Gove.

Ian Scrimgeour, senior executive director with the NT Geological Survey said as a result of the exploration, there had been an 84 per cent increase in the NT’s lithium resources in the past year as well as well as identification Australia’s largest graphite resource near Pine Creek.