MINERAL BOOM BRINGS BENEFITS AND RESPONSIBILITIES

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31587, 26 January 1968, Page 8

MINERAL BOOM BRINGS BENEFITS AND RESPONSIBILITIES

(By

SIR MAURICE MAW BY,

chairman of

Conzinc Riotinto, of Australia, Ltd.)

Australia has found mineral riches in increasing abundance in recent years. They have helped increase our nation’s stature in the eyes of the world, and are attracting many overseas companies to our shores in the hope that they too may share in our good fortune.

In the 1850’s the discovery of gold brought much-needed migrants and capital to Australia, and they accelerated our development greatly. Nowadays a wide range of minerals, each of increasing importance to 20th Century industry is the attraction.

Many vast and high-grade ore-bodies have been found, and some of bauxite and iron ore have proved to be among the largest in the world. Australia has well over 100 years supply at planned rates of extraction of bauxite, iron ore, black and brown coal, most of the construction and refractory materials and salt, to satisfy domestic and export requirements. Reserves of copper, lead, zinc, silver, mineral sands, natural gas and manganese are sufficient for well over 50 years on the basis of present and known future requirements.

The Australian mainland and its continental shelf are at last beginning to reveal their long-sought oil and natural-gas secrets, and a number of discoveries, particularly in Bass Strait, Queensland, and Westen Queensland, give hope that before many years pass, we may become a net exporter of petroleum ducts..Encouraged by these discoveries and its political and economic stability, Australia has become a Mecca for many overseas mining and exploration companies. About 140 have joined us in the search for new ore bodies, 50 of these being mainly interested in oil. These companies bring with them capital and knowledge and both are welcome.

Unfortunately, most of the more obvious, outcropping ore bodies have been discovered by now, and the search for sub-surface deposits is far more difficult. The prospector today needs far more than a keen eye and a geologist’s hammer. The surface of our huge 3.000,000 square mile continent has never been scrutinised and analysed in so sophisticated a fashion as it is right now. As a result of exploration successes, there are at present about 50 relatively large mineral projects under construction, expanding or about to begin. Collectively they involve the expenditure of more than 5A2500 million, and more projects will follow.

Mineral Boom The effects of Australia’s

mining boom on relations with other countries is proving to be quite profound, and trade, economic and even cultural ties are becoming stronger. Australia has long been a traditional supplier of ores in treated and untreated form, and although it is unlikely that the treatment of all ores and concentrates will be carried out in Australia, it is important for us to do as much treatment as possible within our own shores.

The mineral industry is doing much to justify the description of Australia by the late Prime Minister, Mr Holt, as a “continent of stability in Asia.” He said with justification that “a new intimacy was developing with Japan and Indonesia and other free nations of Asia, and a still closer relationship with New Zealand through the sharing of common tasks.” Australia belongs to the Asian and Pacific regions. It shares many common problems with the countries of these regions and there is much to be gained through trying to solve these problems in a co-operative manner. Asia has become Australia’s largest regional market for exports, with more than onethird going there. Japan has replaced Great Britain as Australia’s biggest customer and will become bigger as deliveries gain momentum under the huge iron ore and pellet contracts.

Australian based companies,, most of these being consortiums with overseas partners, have signed to deliver

almost 400 million tons of ore and pellets worth close to SA3OOO million. Australia has never had contracts like these before. They provide for deliveries to take place at set prices over long periods—two factors which would give great stability to any industry. From all the forecasts which have been made, Australia will supply even greater tonnages of ore to Japan. A Japanese delegation came to Australia recently led by Mr Hosai Hyuga, President of Sumitomo Metal Industries, who quoted these figures:— For the year ending March 31, 1967, the Japanese steel industry imported 3.5 million tons of ore from Australia, or 7 per cent of its total requirements. By 1971, it should be importing 25.4 million tons or about 35 per cent of total consumption. In the long run, Australia should be supplying at least 40 per cent of Japan’s iron ore requirements—these having been estimated at more than 100 million tons a year in the early 1970’5.

Australia is anxious to supply ores and metals to other

Asian countries and Hong Kong, and regularly sends out trade missions. We already have a fine reputation for the quality of our exported products. Assistance There is yet another aspect' of relations with other countries which concerns us and this is fully as important as commerce. The boom in Australia’s mining industry is bringing a good share of prosperity to us, but it is also bringing added responsibilities. We in Australia accept that we must help less fortunate countries to develop and to gain the benefits enjoyed by older Western countries. The gaps which exist between living standards throughout the world must be closed. The Australian Government sponsors assistance through the Colombo Plan and through agencies such as the Economic Commission for Asia and the Far East (E.C.A.F.E.), the membership of which has grown from 10 to 29 members since 1947, and through the Asian Development Bank of which it is one of the larger contributors.

Australian industry itself is also anxious to help. Assistance is somewhat limited at present but is rapidly increasing through organisations like the Japan-Australia Business Co-operation Committee. My own company has arranged the exchange of engineers and technical knowledge between countries.

It is giving active encouragement to the study of Japanese in Australia through a comprehensive scholarship scheme, and as with many other Australian companies, our senior technical and sales people commute regularly through the countries of the Asian and Pacific areas. Partners

New Zealand figures prominently in our thoughts as a trading partner, and as a country with most interesting mineral and metallurgical possibilities. New Zealand is Australia’s biggest customer in the South Pacific area and buys about 6| per cent of our exports. .

Australia’s interests there are increasing. Numerous companies are looking for ore bodies, especially copper, and sales of aluminium ingot and billet to New Zealand customers are increasing.

Planning by the Australian aluminium complex, Comalco, for a possible aluminium smelter at Bluff in the South Island which would supply the international market, is another important consideration. This smelter would use power from the Manapouri hydro-electric scheme—conceived principally by Comalco—and now being constructed by the New Zealand Government. The scheme is well advanced although difficult conditions encountered in its extreme south-west location have caused some delay in scheduled progress. Power from the Manapouri scheme should be available in 1969.

Another important Comalco interest Is Hong Kong which is an important customer of primary ingot and billet. Aluminium sold in Hong Kong finds its way into an extraordinary range of places—f- im stems for artificial flowers to ban!: doors.

Australia has always been an important nation in the world of. minerals. It continues to lead non-Communist countries in the mine production of lead, rutile, zircon and opal. In the production of ilmenite and the mine production of zinc, it occupies third place. With gold, silver, copper, bauxite, alumina, and aluminium, production is high and becoming higher, particularly in the bauxite to aluminium field. The ex-mine value of all mineral commodities in 1966 was SA63O million, an increase of nearly 16 per cent on the $A544 million recorded for 1965. As production from some of the newly-discovered deposits gets into top gear, the total value of commodities should rise to about SAIOOO million in a few years time. During the five year period from 1961 to 1966, the value of mineral exports rose 88.2 per cent to SA3SI million. Let’s look more closely at a few minerals in particular. Iron Ore For 20 years the export of iron ore was prevented by an embargo, designed to reserve what were believed to be deposits and others besides, tons for Australia’s use. This was lifted in 1960 and some of the biggest and richest deposits in the world were discovered in the wave of exploration which followed. These have been found mainly in Western Australia and Tasmania over the last five years. One area alone—the Hamersley iron ore province in Western Australia—extends some 300 miles by 100 miles and contains at least 15,000 million tons of better than 50 per cent iron content.

Eight major companies, seven having overseas partners, are devloping the deposits. Some are obligated under the terms of their re-

spective mining agreements to process the ore and to eventually establish steel industries but this would not be for at least 20 years or so. The development of these deposits and others besides, notably bauxite, is resulting in the creation of deepwater ports and other facilities in remote, sparsely populated areas of Australia, which without these discoveries would probably not see the hand of civilisation for many decades, if at all. The Hamersley operation, for example, is about 650 air miles north of Perth, capital of Australia’s largest but most sparsley populated State. The Hamersley company confidently undertook to start the shipment of iron ore in 19 months after the signing of a 65} million ton contract with some of the major steel mills of Japan. In those 19 short months it spent SAIIO million establishing an opencut mine at Tom Price—(a 500 million ton mountain of hematite) —constructing a 182 mile standard gauge railway, and establishing a deep water port capable of taking 100,000 ton bulk carriers.

It has also spent a further SASO million on a 2,000,000 tons-a-year pellet plant which will start deliveries early in 1968, and is investigating the production of metalised agglomerates. Agglomerates are a new form of raw material in producing steel, and consist of a highly metallised material in the form of pellets or. lumps containing about 94 per cent total iron. They can be made directly into steel in basic oxygen furnaces or electric arc furnaces, thus bypassing the intermediate stage of pig iron. . All these developments are resulting from the new iron ore discoveries, but forming a background to them is Australia’s existing iron and steel industry, one of the most efficient and go-ahead in the world. It supplies all Australia’s present needs and is a vigorous exporter. Bauxite As with iron ore Australia also under-estimated its bauxite reserves. This apparent ignorance of our minerals could be interpreted by some as the result of carelessness in exploration. But it is most important to view it in the light of the vastness of Australia, its small population, and until recently the relatively restricted exploration programmes it could mount. About 15 years ago, Australia counted its bauxite reserves in terms of a tew million tons of medium to poor grade material. Today they are conservatively stated to be more than 3000 million tons and could go far higher. Deposits are found in the

Darling Ranges and Kimberley region of Western Australia, and in the Northern Territory, but largest of all is the Weipa deposit on Cape York Peninsula in Queensland, discovered in 1955 and containing at least 2000 million tons.

Two integrated aluminium industries have been established, a third is being developed and yet another is planned. In August, 1967, a 600,000 ton alumina plant owned by an international consortium of American, Canadian, French and Australian interests, was officially

opened at Gladstone in Queensland. Capacity is being increased to 900,000 tons and eventually it may rise to 1.8 million tons. Gladstone obtains its bauxite raw material supplies from Weipa. About the turn of this decade Weipa will have been the base for an investment of nearly SASOO million from which might be expected export sales valued at SA9O million a year. Another alumina plant owned by North American and Australian interests operates at Kwinana in Western Australia. The present capacity of 410,000 tons a year is to be increased to 610,000 tons. The establishment of an alumina plant at Gove in the Northern Terri-

tory by yet another consortium is being investigated. Lead—Silver—Zinc These have long been the base of Australia’s mineral industry and ploughed-back profits have financed the establishment of many of the nation’s secondary industries. Production comes mainly from Broken Hill, New South Wales; Mount Isa, Queensland; and Rosebery, Tasmania. At Broken Hill close to 101 million tons of ore averaging 13.2 per cent lead, 7.30 z silver and 9.1 per cent zinc have been mined, and still has at least 50 years of life ahead. The nation’s lead production of 270,000 tons in 1961, rose to 350,000 tons in 1966, and will probably reach 450,000 tons in 1975. Zinc production increased from 311,000 tons in 1961 to 350,000 tons in 1966, and may reach 550,000 tons in 1975. Associated silver production similarly increased from 13 million oz in 1961 to 17 million oz in 1966, and should reach 25 million oz in 1975. Australia’s capacity to smelt and refine these minerals is considerable and is being constantly enlarged. Among its plants are the largest single lead smelter-refinery in the world at Port Pirie, annual capacity 220,000 long tons, and the third largest high purity zinc smelter at Risdon, Tasmania, annual capacity about 140,000 long tons. Copper Australia’s reserves of cop-per-bearing ores are also substantial and are being increased by further revelopment and exploration. Production of copper metal, however, was static in the five

ever, was static in the five years from 1961 to 1966 at about 95,000 tons. The Mount Isa field with published

reserves of 34 million tons of 3.5 per cent copper, is Australia’s most important, an.d a SAI3O million expansion programme there should be completed in the 1967-68 financial year.

Copper should be subject to many price fluctuations in the years ahead because of the inevitable variations in supply from countries such as the Congo, Zambia and even Chile. There is certainly a case for more orderly marketing arrangements with this metal. Oil, Gas Among Australia's newly found mineral riches, these shine perhaps the brightest. In 1966, imports of crude petroleum were at their highest level at SA2O2 million, and represented over 72 per cent of total imports. At this most opportune time, Australia now has excellent prospects of gaining self-sufficiency in petroleum and reticulating natural gas to industry and home users. Several commercial petroleum fields have been established including the Moonie and Alton fields in Queensland which together produce 10,000 barrels of oil daily, and Barrow Island in Western Australia which shipped out its first crude only last April. The Bass Strait area between the States of Victoria and Tasmania holds most promise, for series of extensive natural gas and petroleum reserves have been found in the last 18 months. Plans are being implemented to pipe the gas to the Victorian capital, Melbourne, population 2,000,000, and to other centres, and hopes are high also that the Bass Strait area could supply between 50 per cent to 75 per cent of the nation’s oil needs by the mid70’s.

Oil exploration programmes have been rejuvenated by these discoveries, and we are hopeful that other discoveries will follow. Australia possesses a large number of extensive sedimentary basins but expensive survey work, and many hundreds of thousands rf feet of expensive survey and drilling, will be required before the full answers of the question of our reserves are known. Other Minerals After lean times for several years, Australia's black coal industry has revived considerably, mainly as a result of discoveries of rich deposits in Queensland, the application of mechanisation, export sales to Japan and to increased domestic demand. Production increased from 24 million tons in 1961 to 33 million in 1966, and should reach at least 40 million tons by 1975. An important deposit of nickel has been developed at Kambalda, Western Australia, and the treatment and export of nickel concentrates has commenced. Recent work suggests that this former area of gold exploration interest might well emerge as a most important nickel, and perhaps base metal producer. Large areas of tin-bearing sulphide ore on the West Coast of Tasmania guarantee an increasing production of tin in the years ahead. Australia has an extensive mineral sands industry and produces about 93 per cent of the world’s rutile, about 77 per cent of its zircon and between 15 per cent and 20 per cent, of ilmenite. Monazite is also produced. These come from Western Australia and a 500 mile stretch of the east Australian coast.

The production of these modern-age minerals is steadily increasing.