Currently enjoying a population of 19,000 people, there are real fears the upcoming closure of Glencore’s underground copper mine in July will see thousands of people leave the town and potentially drop the population under the critical mass needed to run important regional centre industries like health, education, transport, and even future mining projects.

Mayor Peta MacRae said the pending closure of Glencore’s copper mine - which is predicted to remove 1200 jobs from the workforce - highlights the need for “immediate action” to replace those jobs.

“As the world transitions to a low-carbon future, Mount Isa is uniquely positioned to play a leading role.”

The zinc and lead deposits in the Mount Isa region are some of the highest-grade in the world - to the point where Mount Isa lead is used in submarine batteries.

Mount Isa’s location on incredibly mineral-rich deposits (it’s estimated there is $680bn still in the ground across the North West Minerals Province) and its highly skilled mining workforce are two key factors leading council’s new 203-page Mount Isa Future Ready Economy Roadmap, launched on Friday, February 21.

Priority projects short-listed for immediate action include lobbying for a Critical Minerals and Rare Earths Research Centre, a fertiliser and battery acid plant, battery anode material (BAM) project, acid production from pyrite in mine tailings, supporting energy storage start-up Green Gravity, airfreight initiative Flying Whales, building truck amenities and a fuel depot, and lobbying for a correctional facility.

Right now the closest prison to Mount Isa is the Townsville Correctional Centre.

Mayor MacRae is pushing for Mount Isa to receive $2bn from the Federal Government’s Future Made in Australia strategy and the Critical Minerals fund, which if given will help bankroll 28 identified projects.

Cheap energy creates mines

Outback at Isa tour guide, former underground miner and official mining “legend” Steve Carson said the biggest problem for mines was the cost of electricity.

“I have friends who tell me if we had cheap power, there are three to four new mines that would get off the ground,” Mr Carson said.

“I’m one of the positive people, I know my grandchildren will have jobs here... we’ve got everything here except iron ore and coal, and there is still a lot waiting to be found.”

The retired miner said growth - including in tourism - was “all going to happen, it just needs people to be positive”.

Tourism has ‘a lot of potential’

Sunset Tourist Park and Mount Isa Coaches owner Michelle Valinoti said tourism was the ‘next big thing for Isa’.

“We are the only other sealed road that goes from east to west Australia, other than the Nullarbor,” Ms Valinoti said.

“People stop here, they get their car serviced, top up, get their hair done, change the tyres.”

Ms Valinoti said the biggest challenge was helping people ‘feel safe’ travelling across remote regions - something that was slowly increasing thanks to air conditioned caravans and Facebook groups.

“Our tourism season is essentially Father’s Day to Mother’s Day, and in the summer we get a lot of internationals because it’s their winter,” she said.

“We also know locals want to see Lake Moondarra developed to include camping, dogs, and a shuttle bus.”

Big tourism goals for the town included lobbying Virgin and Qantas for more affordable flights, more walking trails, growing ‘The Granites’ as a sunset dining spot, and farm-to-table tourism.

During community consultation, Mount Isa City Council said locals showed a lot of interest in growing agriculture into camel meat, camel cheese, and native botanicals.

Growing Indigenous tourism

In December, Outback at Isa started up a new art gallery specifically to display and sell art created by northwest Queensland Indigenous artists.

The Maltha Waru gallery is the first of its kind for the town, and was created to help tourists who were constantly asking where they could buy Indigenous art.

Kalkadoon Elder Barbara Sam displays her own art at the Maltha Waru centre, and said there was a lot of potential to grow Indigenous tourism in Mount Isa by highlighting the Kalkadoon’s skills as renowned stone-axe makers, doing bushtucker tours and more.

A few hours from everything

Tourism is a sector council is keen to expand - not just to capture more holiday-makers, but also their own cashed-up residents enjoying seven-day weekends.

Long-time local David McCrindle wears a lot of hats in town, working as a firefighter, tour bus driver and baggage handler at the Mount Isa airport.

Embodying the attitude of a true rural Australian, Mr McCrindle said Mount Isa was in the centre of everything.

“It’s only eight hours down to Birdsville for the Big Red Bash and Boulia is right there for the camel races.”

Mr McCrindle said a lot of residents on mine shift rosters would spend their seven-days off up in The Gulf fishing.

The Gulf of Carpentaria is consider one of the best fisheries in the world thanks to its unique tide patterns.

Glencore says expansion in the pipeline

Currently the town’s biggest employer, Glencore will be closing the 101-year-old mine Mount Isa is built around in July, and the Lady Loretta mine in December.

Glencore COO of zinc and copper assets Sam Strohmayr said during workforce negotiations the original estimate of 1200 lost jobs was revised down to 500 after a number of employees opted for retirement or redeployment to the George Fisher mine 15kms away.

“We are aiming to replace contract fly-in, fly-out roles at George Fisher Mine with the redeployment of people from MICO (Mount Isa),” Mr Strohmayr said.

George Fisher has an expected mine life beyond 2040.

Another area Glencore is looking to ramp up is re-opening the Black Star open cut mine.

“The pre-feasibility study is well advanced, with a $6.8m drilling program underway to inform the next phase of the project.” Mr Strohmayr said.

“The Black Star Open Cut Expansion project, if successful, would see a steady state workforce of between 300-400 people across a 10-20 year mine life.”

Black Star - also located in the heart of Mount Isa - was originally closed because the open cut was getting too close to the underground copper mine.

Mount Isa will also retain the copper smelter and lead-zinc smelter, but Glencore has warned the smelting industry was under global pressure due to government-backed smelter expansions in China, India, Indonesia and more.

“Recently in China we saw smelters actually paying the mines to treat their concentrate... we’re not immune to this and it’s a very difficult time economically,” Mr Strohmayr said.

30 per cent solar energy

Renewable energy is not a far-off dream for Mount Isa - right now, their energy grid is up to 30 per cent solar thanks to the connection of Australia’s largest ‘off-grid’ solar farm in 2024.

Cut off entirely from the national energy grid, Mount Isa gets its power from the North West Power System (NWPS) owned by the APA.

The outback grid was mainly fed by APA’s 242MW gas-fired Diamantina Power Station, but it was recently joined by a 88MW Dugald River Solar Farm.

APA’s operations and maintenance manager Sam Floriani said the activation of 184,000 solar panels which rotate and follow the sun throughout the day delivered an immediate uplift.

“The Dugald River Solar Farm instantly increased renewable energy capacity in the NWPS to around 35 per cent,” Mr Floriani said.

“Hopefully Mount Isa is proud they have this many (solar) megawatts coming in.”

The vast bulk of the power coming from the solar farm is being purchased by MMG’s Dugald River Mine - hence why the mine got naming rights.

In 2024, Dugald River general manager Tim Akroyd said the mine was already seeing a 33 per cent reduction in energy-related emissions and costs.

Storing energy with gravity

Green Gravity is one of four ‘enterprise opportunities’ Mount Isa City Council has been supportive of.

The Wollongong-based company aims to use a pulley system that raises and lowers heavy weights down disused mine shafts to store and generate low-cost renewable electricity.

The pulley system works by using solar and excess electricity during the day to lift weights to the surface, then lowering them when the grid needs power - such as in the evenings.

Described as being hydro power without the water, Green Gravity signed a memorandum of understanding with Mount Isa City Council in October, 2024, to commence studies with Glencore to assess the potential of repurposing mineshafts once the underground copper mine closes in July.

Green Gravity estimates the development of their system could create over 350 full-time jobs.