Globally diversified mining and metals firm South32 expects to acquire approval for its Worsley Alumina mine improvement challenge – a mine life extension challenge – from the Western Australia state later this month and federal approval early in 2025.
This follows the optimistic consequence of an attraction of an earlier determination by the Western Australian Environmental Safety Authority (EPA), which beneficial that the challenge be accepted, however topic to situations that South32 mentioned went past affordable measures for managing environmental dangers and would create important working challenges.
“On 12 December 2024, the Western Australian Minister for Surroundings decided the attraction consequence for the challenge. We’re happy to advise that the Minister has decided, after contemplating accessible info, that the EPA’s evaluation and general conclusion that the challenge could also be applied, topic to situations, is affordable.
“Additional, the Minister has agreed with the appeals committee’s suggestions to amend particular situations primarily based on the arguments introduced throughout the appeals course of, together with by Worsley Alumina,” South32 reviews.
It notes that the Minister’s determination is in keeping with the Western Australian authorities’s Greenhouse Fuel Emissions Coverage for Main Tasks, with greenhouse-gas emissions to be regulated in accordance with the Commonwealth Authorities Safeguard Mechanism and pointless duplication between commonwealth and state regulation eliminated.
“An in depth evaluation of different situations referred to within the Minister’s willpower is below means,” South32 says.
The event challenge is aimed toward extending the lifetime of the Boddington bauxite mine, which is situated about 130 km from Perth. The mined bauxite is transported to a refinery and became alumina powder.
The alumina powder is ten transported to the Bunbury port for export to South32’s Hillside and Mozal aluminium smelters in South Africa and Mozambique, respectively.
