Exciting phosphate future goes beyond food security

North-West Queensland's phosphate riches offer opportunities beyond the fertiliser business, with the battery market also set to spark ongoing demand, a local mine developer says. North West Phosphate managing director John Cotter. Speaking ahead of the annual North West MPX Conference, North West Phosphate managing director John Cotter said he was excited about the future of phosphate and what it would mean for the region. “Plenty of people know that phosphate can be used in fertilisers, but the other uses for phosphate are relatively unknown at a household level and more exciting uses for phosphate are being investigated and discovered all the time,” Mr Cotter said. “In 2020, the global lithium iron phosphate battery market size was over $US8 billion and it’s expected to grow considerably to more than $US49 billion by 2028. “Lithium iron phosphate batteries are capable of charging and discharging at high speed compared to other types of batteries making them ideal for use in passenger cars, buses and hybrid electric vehicles due to their safety and low cost.” Avenira is an example of an Australian firm pursuing this avenue, with phosphate from its Wonarah project in the Northern Territory's Barkly region set to feed a proposed LFP (lithium-ferro-phosphate) battery cathode manufacturing facility. Mr Cotter said North West Phosphate continued to explore uses for its phosphate deposits, including in cathode material production, as part of its long-term strategy. But its current focus was in serving significant demand in the agricultural sector both in Australia and overseas. North West Phosphate is working towards a 2024 start to production at its $290 million Paradise South project, about 130km north-west of Mount Isa. By last month it had lined up customers in the agricultural sector for three-quarters of its planned 1Mtpa phosphate concentrate output. “At the moment, most of the phosphate being used in fertiliser production comes from Africa, but Australia has large deposits of phosphate, especially in the Georgina Basin,” Mr Cotter said. “Our first project to come online will be Paradise South and within that project there is 256 million tonnes of mineral resource, enough for more than 50 years of mine life producing 1 million tonnes of phosphate concentrate per year. “Once it is out of the ground, we sort, wash and dry it using a beneficiation process that changes the ore to a concentrate. From there, it’ll be sold to Australian farmers or export to the more than 300 million people all within three to five days of shipping from Australia.” “We have a massive opportunity to get Australian phosphate for use as a fertiliser to grow the protein and clean produce that the world needs to support our population.”

Exciting phosphate future goes beyond food security

Industry Queensland

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