Posted on 23 Nov 2023
Queensland is welcoming applications for the eighth round of Queensland’s collaborative exploration initiative (CEI) grants programme to support explorers looking for critical mineral deposits in the Australian state.
The grants, totalling AUD 4.6 million ($3m), will prioritise the exploration for critical minerals needed for solar panels, turbines, batteries and other energy transition technologies, Kallanish learns from a government statement on Wednesday. The applications for the new CEI grant will close on 11 January 2024.
“We know the mineral exploration projects being done today have the potential to be our mining projects of the future which is why these grants are so important,” says Queensland’s resources minister Scott Stewart. “Queensland has significant resources of the critical minerals the world needs to decarbonise and through these grants, we are helping back companies to find those deposits.”
Until the end of June, overall mineral exploration in Queensland increased by 4.4% to AUD 770.6m, with copper deposit exploration increasing by 16.7%, the minister adds, citing the Australian Bureau of Statistics.
The CEI programme builds on the Queensland critical minerals strategy, which is offering zero rent for new and existing exploration permits for minerals for the next five years, starting 1 September 2023. Last month, the state government also announced AUD 1.3 billion to advance construction of the $5 billion CopperString 2032 project. The government believes the 1,100-km high-voltage electricity transmission line will help unlock a potential $500 billion of critical mineral projects in the North West Minerals province.
Queensland boasts some of the world’s richest critical mineral-producing areas, including for copper, lead, zinc, nickel, cobalt, tungsten, graphite, vanadium and rare earths. Early this month, the state government appointed Sedgman as the managing contractor for Australia’s first critical minerals processing facility, to be located in in Townsville, Queensland (see related story).
Source:Kallanish
