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LNG, steel boost central Queensland’s recovery

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Queensland is on the economic boil, despite the proposed ‘fire sale’ by government of some of its high maintenance assets, such as above ground minerals industry rail systems and the Port of Brisbane infrastructure.

  

By June Cummings

Gladstone, with its well developed port facilities and industrial base is the centre for three individual proposals under environmental scrutiny – a new steel making works and two LNG plants, that could change the economic and growth potential of central Queensland.
The release of the EIS for the controversial Queensland Curtis LNG Curtis Island project brings this multi-billion project a step further along the federal and state governments’ approval chain. It would pipe LNG from the Darling Downs and employ 4000 workers during construction and1000 in operations.
On a much larger scale is the Australia Pacific LNG project by Origin Energy and ConocoPhillips, which has released its draft terms of reference, with its plant also earmarked for Curtis Island on 230ha of land at Laird Point.
It would require major expansions of the Surat and Bowen basin coal gas fields and a 10-year construction phase with 10,300 jobs, the majority in regional Queensland.
The two LNG projects would involve storage tanks and processing plants on Curtis Island plus loading and export facilities from the plants for around 60 LNG vessels a year.
An examination of up to 730km of underground pipeline to move coal seam gas to Curtis Island processing plants is underway. The first exports of LNG could start in 2012 with a big boost from 2014 onwards.
The new LNG industry is estimated to attract private sector investment of $40bn, an annual export of 50 million tonnes of LNG, the creation of 18,000 jobs and a bonanza in state funds.
Also in the proposal chain is Boulder Steel Limited’s $2.2bn steel processing plant which would create a whole new industry for central Queensland, but would have the highest environmental standards ever achieved in steel production.
It would be built in two stages, with the first costing $1.1bn and generating exports of 2.1million tonnes of steel per annum (mtpa), and the second stage, 5 mtpa.
As an added environmental bonus, a co-generation power plant would be built in conjunction with the steel works using its waste gas and heat, with the electricity generated supplied to the national grid. It will use natural gas as a top-up fuel.
 


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