{"id":684653,"date":"2026-05-21T06:54:16","date_gmt":"2026-05-21T06:54:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/684653\/"},"modified":"2026-05-21T06:54:16","modified_gmt":"2026-05-21T06:54:16","slug":"arafura-rare-earths-mine-green-lit-as-federal-government-agrees-to-buy-500-tonnes-of-product-per-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/684653\/","title":{"rendered":"Arafura Rare Earths mine green-lit as federal government agrees to buy 500 tonnes of product per year"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Northern Territory rare earths mine at the centre of a Trump-Albanese deal will go ahead, after the federal government agreed to buy up to 500 tonnes of product per year.<\/p>\n

Arafura Rare Earths has announced the Nolans mine 135 kilometres north of Alice Springs will go ahead, decades after it was first flagged as a prospect.<\/p>\n

Nolans has received hundreds of millions of dollars in public funding and was listed as a priority<\/a> in a critical minerals deal between the US and Australian governments last year.<\/p>\n

Multi-billionaire Gina Rinehart is also a key investor in the project, which would extract and then process rare earths, producing NdPr oxide.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Nolans was at the centre of a deal struck in Washington beteen Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, and US President Donald Trump. (Reuters: Kevin Lamarque)<\/p>\n

Managing director Darryl Cuzzubbo told the ABC Country Hour the announcement was “the starting line” and production was several years away.<\/p>\n

“We’re very excited to be moving into construction \u2026 there’s a lot of parties that have supported us, different levels of government, different investors,” he said.<\/p>\n

“A big thank you to them and their support.”<\/p>\n

NdPr oxide is used in electric vehicle motors, renewable energy production, defence technology and advanced manufacturing.<\/p>\n

Nolans would be Australia’s first ore-to-oxide rare earths facility, with a sulphuric acid plant<\/a> planned for processing.<\/p>\n

The federal government expects the site to supply about 4 to 5 per cent of global demand when at full capacity.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Darryl Cuzzubbo says the project has long-term commercial viability. (ABC News: Keane Bourke)<\/p>\n

Mr Cuzzubbo said it took decades to reach a final investment decision due to the complexities of building a processing facility, as well as a mine, in a market dominated by China.<\/p>\n

Mr Cuzzubbo said Nolans will provide a viable supply alternative to Chinese operations.<\/p>\n

“Almost all of the rare earths produced globally are only processed to a concentrate or a carbonate, whereas we take it one step further to an oxide,” he said<\/p>\n

“We have done that so that we can be an ex-China source of rare earths.”<\/p>\n

He said government support was crucial in securing private investment.<\/p>\n

“Investors need to have seen that government support to be confident that ultimately pricing won’t be controlled by one entity,” he said.<\/p>\n

“It’s important that like-minded governments and countries show a determination to break the control of pricing for rare earths.”\"an<\/p>\n

Arafura Rare Earths has previously built an accommodation village for workers at the Nolans site. (Supplied: Arafura Rare Earths)<\/p>\n

The federal government has committed to buy up to 500 tonnes of NdPr oxide per year, with funds from its $1.2 billion Critical Minerals Strategic Reserve.<\/p>\n

It is the first time the reserve has been used, according to federal Resources Minister Madeleine King.<\/p>\n

Arafura has also signed supply agreements with a range of international companies.<\/p>\n

This includes South Korean car manufacturers Hyundai and Kia, German renewable energy company Siemens Gamesa and US commodity trader Traxys.<\/p>\n

China’s dominance\u00a0<\/p>\n

A sustainable minerals expert at the University of Queensland, Ian Satchwell, said Nolans would reinforce Australia’s position as the “pre-eminent” supplier of rare earths outside China.<\/p>\n

“China currently produces more than 80 per cent of the world’s light and heavy rare earths, and very close to 100 per cent of heavy rare earths,” he said.<\/p>\n

“[Nolans] will be a significant inroad into the market and it will mean that China has less control over the global market.”\"Man<\/p>\n

Ian Satchwell says Australia is the second biggest supplier of rare earths, behind China.\u00a0 (ABC News: Glyn Jones)<\/p>\n

Professor Satchwell said China had long used its dominance to manipulate prices.<\/p>\n

“China’s behaving from their perspective, quite rationally; they dominate rare earths mining and processing,” he said.<\/p>\n

“It’s in their best interests to keep competitors out of the market.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Northern Territory rare earths mine at the centre of a Trump-Albanese deal will go ahead, after the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":684654,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[139381,64,63,99,106858,48493,330037,62900,4251,6827,231438,124700,3281],"class_list":["post-684653","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-arafura","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-business","tag-critical","tag-earths","tag-final-investment","tag-mine","tag-minerals","tag-mining","tag-nolans","tag-rare","tag-trump"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/684653","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=684653"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/684653\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/684654"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=684653"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=684653"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=684653"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}