The New South Wales Government’s new Critical Minerals and High-Tech Metals Strategy outlines a vision for the state to become a world leader in critical minerals.
As the first actions under the strategy, the State Government will examine the implementation of a rapid assessment framework for mineral mining projects and create a $250 million royalty deferral initiative for critical minerals projects.
There are currently 12 critical minerals mining and processing projects in New South Wales that are ready for investment, needing around $7.6 billion in capital investment value. These projects are expected to generate about 4,600 jobs during construction and 2,700 ongoing jobs.
High initial investment costs for critical minerals projects are a barrier for the industry. The royalty deferral scheme will assist new projects in the early stages of development, ease financial pressures, attract investment to New South Wales and enhance the economic viability of the sector.
Another immediate action from the strategy is a joint Department of Planning Housing and Infrastructure and NSW Resources assessment to deliver greater certainty to the sector around the planning process for critical minerals projects.
New South Wales has globally significant resource deposits and 21 of the 31 nationally declared critical minerals. The strategy identifies priority minerals and metals for the state – including rare earths, scandium, cobalt, copper and silver – which have important uses in electrifying the economy and manufacturing clean energy products like solar panels and batteries.
The strategy outlines the vital role of critical minerals in supporting broader government priorities, including in the clean energy transition and driving domestic manufacturing.
The International Energy Agency estimates that over the next 20 years, the world will need six times the amount of critical minerals currently mined to reach global net zero carbon emissions. The energy transition will need double today’s copper production, triple today’s rare earth elements and cobalt production, and thirty times more nickel. All these minerals can be found in New South Wales.
Fully realising the opportunity of the state’s critical minerals and high-tech metals deposits means moving further down the supply chain and beyond only extracting and exporting resources. The strategy includes examples of this, such as investigating opportunities to pilot common-user refineries and supporting investment in domestic manufacturing.
The new Critical Minerals and High-Tech Metals Strategy focuses on five key pillars:
- Encouraging exploration by minimising investment risk in greenfield exploration and promoting exploration in new areas
- Incentivising production by creating an attractive investment environment and removing barriers to help projects move from exploration to production
- Developing future-ready skills by providing training and education pathways to encourage careers in critical minerals mining
- Establishing resilient supply chains by examining local processing facilities, driving research and development, and investigating critical minerals recycling
- Engaging local communities by ensuring responsible mining
The royalty initiative will be an opt-in scheme in which the first five years of royalties are deferred. It will apply to critical minerals projects that can start production between 1 July 2025 and 30 June 2030, predominantly mine commodities listed on the Federal Government’s Critical Minerals List, and where the proponent has a market capitalisation under $5 billion.
New South Wales Premier, Chris Minns, said that New South Wales has the metals and minerals the world needs and is open for business.
“We are sending a clear message to Aussie and global miners: invest in New South Wales.
“This is about backing regional jobs and manufacturing jobs and taking advantage of the critical minerals boom.
“We want to make sure we fully realise the opportunities that critical minerals and high-tech metals have for New South Wales.”
New South Wales Minister for Planning and Public Spaces, Paul Scully, said that it is important that the state’s planning system operates efficiently and provides certainty and transparency to the critical minerals sector and communities for New South Wales to be a global critical minerals leader.
“The strategy identifies several improvements we can make to help enhance the system. These will provide greater guidance to the industry and improve collaboration between government agencies and departments in project assessment.
“We’re also investigating further ways to improve decision-making to ensure we fully realise the opportunity before us.”
New South Wales Minister for Natural Resources, Courtney Houssos, said the government’s vision is for New South Wales to be a global leader in critical minerals and high-tech metals, generating economic prosperity through exploration, mining, processing and advanced manufacturing.
“New South Wales critical minerals projects typically have long lead times for development and higher capital investment. The new royalty deferral scheme will assist mine proponents to attract investment and move faster to production.
“We want New South Wales to be moving further down the supply chain. Extracting minerals is a critical first step, but we can generate strong economic returns and support more jobs by getting into processing and advanced manufacturing.”
New South Wales Minister for Industry and Trade, Anoulack Chanthivong, said, “The new Critical Minerals and High-Tech Metals Strategy forms a key part of the New South Wales Government’s approach to industry policy, which seeks to invest and promote home-grown products and services not only for New South Wales but for export right around the world.
“This strategy provides a long-term vision and commitment to the critical minerals and high-tech metals mining industry so that businesses can feel confident to invest and grow in New South Wales as we seize the investment opportunities of the renewable energy economy, both here and across the globe.”