Episode 88
Energy Transition and A Rare Earth Mine’s Journey To Net Zero
Episode Summary: a conversation with Stewart Watkins and Max Van Someren on sustainability and the Nolans project, a rare earth minerals mining project in Western Australia
Rare earth minerals play a crucial role in the energy transition, as they are used in various applications like electric vehicles and wind turbines. However, the mining of these minerals has had a poor environmental record.
To understand how an Australian mining project is improving this issue, we had a conversation with Stewart Watkins and Max Van Someren, where we discussed the broader context of the Nolans project in the energy transition. We also explored the project's key sustainability pillars in both mining and processing, to understand how the project can contribute to a more sustainable future.
About the Nolans project
A presentation by Net Zero Perth on the Nolans Project
For more information on the project and to order your copy of the Carbon Almanac, visit thecarbonalmanac.org
Want to join in the conversation?
Visit thecarbonalmanac.org/podcasts and send us a voice message on this episode or any other climate-related ideas and perspectives.
Don’t Take Our Word For It, Look It Up!
You can find out more on page 167, 172, 242, 252 and 253 of the Carbon Almanac and on the website you can tap the footnotes link and type in 100, 092, 124, 120 and 112
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Olabanji is from Lagos Nigeria, he’s a Creative Director and visual designer that helps brands gain clarity, deliver meaningful experiences and build tribes through Design & Strategy. He founded Jorney - a community designed to help people stay productive, accountable, and do their best work.
Leekei is a fashion business founder, a business coach, an international development expert and podcaster from Paris, France.
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The CarbonSessions Podcast is produced and edited by Leekei Tang, Steve Heatherington and Rob Slater.
Transcript
Hi, I'm Ima.
Speaker:I live in Scotland.
Speaker:Hi, I'm Jen and I'm from Canada.
Speaker:Hi, I'm Ola Vanji and I'm from Nigeria.
Speaker:Hello, I'm Leaky and I live in Paris.
Speaker:Hey, I'm Rod.
Speaker:I'm from Peru.
Speaker:Welcome to Carbon Sessions, a podcast with carbon conversations for every day with
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Speaker:can actually do to make a difference.
Speaker:So don't be shy.
Speaker:Join our carbon sessions because it's not too late.
Speaker:Hi, I'm Ricky.
Speaker:Hi, I'm Ji.
Speaker:Okay, Ji uh, do you have a smartphone?
Speaker:Uh, yeah, yeah, I do.
Speaker:I do have a smartphone.
Speaker:Do you drive an electric car?
Speaker:Uh, No, I don't drive at all right now.
Speaker:Um, so have you ever heard about Rare Earth Element?
Speaker:Did you say Rare Earth?
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Rare Earth?
Speaker:Uh, well, sort of, I don't know.
Speaker:Uh, I mean, I've probably heard that it's all around us in devices here
Speaker:and there, but I, I, I can mistake that for plastic, to be honest.
Speaker:I don't, I really don't know.
Speaker:So you wanna tell me about Rare Earth?
Speaker:Well, I don't know anything about rare Earth neighbor, uh, but I know that it's
Speaker:a very important component of in the energy transition but that's fine if we
Speaker:don't know any other rare earth, because today we have some amazing guests all the
Speaker:way from Australia joining us we have, stewards WA Kings and Max one submarine.
Speaker:Hi, max and Stewart.
Speaker:Hello.
Speaker:How are you doing?
Speaker:, you've heard a very dummy conversation about we don't know what rare I is, so
Speaker:maybe we, we can start of by talking about, you can start, talking about,
Speaker:the Net Zero network and, um, where, you know, where, how does it fit in the energy
Speaker:transition, um, program in Australia?
Speaker:Yeah, sure.
Speaker:Um, I will, I'll jump in at that point.
Speaker:Leaky, um, and that will be a nice way to explain how I found out
Speaker:what rare elsewhere and how they fit into the energy transition.
Speaker:Um, the net there Network is a, a group here in Perth, in Western
Speaker:Australia, which was founded by me and a couple of others, about two years.
Speaker:Because we were reading about the importance of climate change and
Speaker:the potential changes that were going to be required in society and
Speaker:within the economy, but we weren't really sure how as individuals
Speaker:we could get involved to do more.
Speaker:We knew that there were small scale things that we could do, like saving
Speaker:energy around our own homes, but we didn't feel like that was enough.
Speaker:We wanted to use our professional skills to have more impact.
Speaker:Um, and I didn't know who to talk to about that.
Speaker:So a small group of us got together and we decided to form a group which would help
Speaker:each other to identify opportunities for, get involved, to get involved and do more.
Speaker:Um, that led to us meeting regularly, uh, hearing from inspiring speakers who
Speaker:had made that transition themselves.
Speaker:And ultimately for me, it led me to move from the job which I was in,
Speaker:which was designing ship, uh, which was pretty interesting, but not directly
Speaker:related to decarbonization, to working with a large engineering company, kbr
Speaker:r helping companies like Aira, who will hear from in a minute, uh, with
Speaker:their decarbonization strategies.
Speaker:Um, And, um, the net network has been fantastic for connecting
Speaker:to all sorts of people.
Speaker:Have helped me understand what that, what, what the options are
Speaker:for industry and society as a whole.
Speaker:Pretty decarbonize.
Speaker:So you came to the product without milli anything about Ra Eber almost.
Speaker:It was, there was definitely a learning curve for me.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So, um, I, I'm an engineer by background and I bought experience
Speaker:in decarbonization technologies.
Speaker:Uh, but uh, I didn't understand the rare Earth domain and, and I'd
Speaker:heard about them I think like most of us have in, in a passing sense.
Speaker:But I wasn't really sure exactly what role they played in the energy transition.
Speaker:Uh, which is I think something that few who've got a much longer background
Speaker:than me in Rare Earth can probably describe to you in much more detail.
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:Max.
Speaker:You know, and, and I think the, the, the funny thing about this is most
Speaker:people dunno what rare earths are.
Speaker:They're, they're those things that sit down at the bottom of the periodic table.
Speaker:Just above uranium and thorium, those fun ones.
Speaker:Um, and, and nobody covers them in high school chemistry, you know, and, and,
Speaker:and the funny part about rare earths is they're not actually that rare.
Speaker:Um mm-hmm.
Speaker:They're rare in as much as they don't often come in a lot of
Speaker:concentration in the earth, but they're, they're kind of all around us.
Speaker:They're all over the place.
Speaker:Um, now rare earths are also not used all that much, but where they are used,
Speaker:they are adding a massive, massive value.
Speaker:Um, the ones that, that, uh, you know, Aira, the company that I work
Speaker:for and joined about five years ago, is really interested in, uh,
Speaker:Emon, neodymium, and Permium, and yeah, everybody stumbles over it.
Speaker:So for that, we call it N D P R because those ones are the ones that go into
Speaker:ultra high strength permanent magnets.
Speaker:We've all sort of played around with, um, you know, those really strong
Speaker:little magnets that stick like, uh, like you can't believe, and then there
Speaker:doesn't seem to be anything to them.
Speaker:Well, those are rare earth magnets, and it's the rare earths that go in there that
Speaker:do all that funky physics stuff and make a, a, a magnet that is so, so super strong
Speaker:that, that you, you wouldn't believe them.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:Does that make sense?
Speaker:So it does make sense.
Speaker:Um, you say it's not that rare, but, so why do we call it rare Earth then?
Speaker:Oh, I'm gonna blame some old chemistry guy.
Speaker:You know?
Speaker:Uh, they're also known as the amides, if you wanna, if you wanna get all
Speaker:chemical, but, um, yeah, they're, they're called rare earths and,
Speaker:and it's a lot easier to explain.
Speaker:I guess they're rare around the earth in as much as.
Speaker:At the moment, it something like about 85% of the rare earth produced
Speaker:in this world are refined, mined, and refined under the control of China.
Speaker:Um, and, and that makes it a very interesting
Speaker:geopolitical situation as well.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:The, the other explanation that I had heard about why they were
Speaker:colloquially called rare earths originally, it's because although
Speaker:there's a lot of them in the aircraft, they're challenging to extract.
Speaker:And so for a long time it was, it was, it was difficult to create a lot of prof,
Speaker:rare earth metal, which made them rare.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:I'll, I'll take that one Max.
Speaker:Um, and you there, Stuart, you touched upon, uh, the incredible properties
Speaker:of Rare Earth, very, very strong magnet Earlier, uh, you guys were
Speaker:talking about how rare earth are involved in, in all sorts of end use
Speaker:uses within the energy transition.
Speaker:Things like electric vehicles, for example.
Speaker:Maybe Stuart, you could just explain how strong magnet.
Speaker:Make things like electric vehicles a better product.
Speaker:Yeah, sure.
Speaker:Um, you know, and, and, and the reason why, uh, get digging into
Speaker:that, you know, when, when you have an electric motor, basically you
Speaker:have two rotating, or one stationary and one rotating magnetic field.
Speaker:So you know that that's how these things work.
Speaker:We'll pick the engineering nerd over here in this corner.
Speaker:So when, when you, when you have a motor and, and particularly an electric
Speaker:vehicle or a, or a wind turbine or, or something like that, really what, what
Speaker:you're trying try, kind of looking for is the lightest weight and the lowest en
Speaker:energy consumption to get you from A to B.
Speaker:It's like in your petrol car, you, you, you wanna be able to drive around using
Speaker:the least amount of petrol in electric vehicle and I've got one on order.
Speaker:Um, you know, you want to be able to drive around plugging it in the least amount
Speaker:and use the least amount of electrons.
Speaker:So if you've got one of those magnetic fields, um, being generated
Speaker:from a permanent magnet, Rather than from an electromagnet, then
Speaker:you are using less energy to get the wheels turning if you like.
Speaker:Now, um, the, the research that we did here when we were doing some marketing
Speaker:work was that a rare earth permanent magnet motor is about 15% more efficient
Speaker:than an induction motor where you've got two, two electromagnet coils.
Speaker:Um, so in that respect, imagine you've got a 15% more efficient,
Speaker:fuel efficient vehicle.
Speaker:So that's why they're super important.
Speaker:And then when you think about, say, a wind turbine, you know, we've got only a
Speaker:certain amount of wind blowing past it.
Speaker:So if you've got 15% more, um, efficiency in your generation, you get 15% more
Speaker:bang for your buck for the capital cost of putting up a wind turbine.
Speaker:Now, I guarantee you guys have actually got a rare earth magnet
Speaker:motor at home right now, or if you haven't, a lot of, a lot of people
Speaker:who listen to this will have.
Speaker:Anybody got a brushless cordless drill, that's what they sell 'em as.
Speaker:Now they've got a permanent magnet motor in it that will generally use rare Earth.
Speaker:So, so they are kind of all around us, but with the energy transition
Speaker:that's going on, the demand for rare earths has really jumped, jumped
Speaker:through the roof in recent days.
Speaker:Add to that, the whole covid situation and wanting to have diversification of supply
Speaker:chains outside of one particular country and, and all of a sudden the, the world
Speaker:is sort of thinking critical minerals.
Speaker:We've all heard about lithium and graphite and so on and so forth, but
Speaker:they're starting to think about rare earths in reality and, and saying,
Speaker:we need different sources of these to actually achieve the goals that we have
Speaker:for decarbonizing our, our society.
Speaker:It, it's interesting, Stuart, that you mentioned the supply
Speaker:chain for railroad there.
Speaker:I was reminded of the other day when I was in Bunnings, which is the chain
Speaker:of hardware doors here in Australia.
Speaker:And I could these, some neodinium magnets, which were on sale, I think
Speaker:they were for hanging pictures.
Speaker:So just these tiny magnets, which you stick to the back of a picture frame.
Speaker:And because of the work that I'm doing with Afuera, it immediately made me
Speaker:think of where that magnet has come from.
Speaker:So where the, where the original iron or, oh, sorry, original, um, nd or would've
Speaker:come from where it would've been processed probably in China, and then it had
Speaker:made its way all the way to Australia.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:So, so if I could, if I could say some of, um, I mean there's a lot of science
Speaker:going around and I'm enjoying it.
Speaker:Um, but so what you're saying is that rare earth makes, um, our use of energy
Speaker:more efficient when, when it comes to electric motors, which you need for an
Speaker:electric vehicle or a wind turbine, those rare earth permanent magnet that go into
Speaker:those, um, motors are more efficient.
Speaker:I mean, rare earths are used in a lot of other things.
Speaker:I mean, yo know, uh, we other rare earths, those are neodymium and
Speaker:Presidium, other rare earths like, um, serum and lanum are used and they're
Speaker:a lot more abundant than N D P R.
Speaker:They're used in catalysts for, um, refining.
Speaker:Um, if you do have a petrol car, you stinky heathen, you know, really
Speaker:the, the catalyst that converts, uh, in the, um, in, in the catalytic
Speaker:converter would have lan in a, in it.
Speaker:So rare earths are all around us, if you like, they're the 11, part of the
Speaker:11, her special herbs and spices that go into making ordinary everyday things.
Speaker:Amazing.
Speaker:. So it's not just rare, it's like rare earth.
Speaker:There's like a lot of them.
Speaker:It's not just one specific thing we're talking about.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:There, there's, there's about, oh, and my, this is where I find the, the chemical
Speaker:engineer doesn't have much chemistry.
Speaker:I think there's about 11 rare earths that are 11 elements that
Speaker:are classified as rare earths.
Speaker:, it's also probably important to differentiate between critical
Speaker:minerals and rare earth, cuz they're two similar founding things.
Speaker:But actually rare earth is a subset of critical minerals.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Um, criticality, uh, when we talk about critical minerals, is really
Speaker:referring to the importance of these whole range of different
Speaker:minerals in the energy transition.
Speaker:Uh, and the fact that supply for a lot of them is gonna have to
Speaker:increase in scale dramatically.
Speaker:Um, but they're not interchangeable terms.
Speaker:Rare earth is one subset of a larger, larger definition.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:And that includes things like copper, for example.
Speaker:So, so traditional metal, but which we're gonna need a lot more
Speaker:of as we electrify everything.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:I've read somewhere.
Speaker:Um, and it's making the headlines in Europe, well actually not
Speaker:real, the headlines, but it's um, it's, uh, it's in Europe.
Speaker:, we have found, um, some rare earth in Sweden, but , it will take some time, it
Speaker:will take probably it's 15 years for, the rare herbs from Sweden to be used in our,
Speaker:, to get into our, phones or electrical.
Speaker:So, and in 15 years we'll even do it.
Speaker:, we would need this kind of a cnce in our, um, vein.
Speaker:So why does it take so long?
Speaker:Look, and, and I think, I think Max touched on it earlier, you know, it,
Speaker:it really comes down to the processing.
Speaker:Um, the, the mining of these things is fairly easy.
Speaker:I mean, you know, dig it up as a whole.
Speaker:It's, it's the same as mining anything.
Speaker:But the processing, because what you're trying to do is take something
Speaker:that's one or 2% of all rare earths.
Speaker:So of our OR body, for example, at Nolan's, um, you know, we're, our
Speaker:head grade is, is around that sort of, you know, about 0.7, 0.8% N D P R.
Speaker:And we take that 0.7 or 0.8%.
Speaker:We refine that to 99.9% N D P R.
Speaker:So, you know, there, there's a massive amount of processing that goes on
Speaker:and, and these things are really, um, there, there's a, uh, there's a lot
Speaker:of chemistry that goes into it to both get it into a form that you can play
Speaker:with it, get it in solution, purify it, separate it from those, from the
Speaker:other rare earths as well at the end.
Speaker:So it's the processing that takes the time.
Speaker:And, and to give you some perspective, you know, Nolans was discovered.
Speaker:That's the project that I'm running, Nolans was discovered in, in about 2001.
Speaker:You know, they're out there looking for uranium.
Speaker:Um, luckily the, the, the, the deposit was largely outcropping, so it was,
Speaker:uh, expressing through the surface.
Speaker:And so a plane with a, a radiometer, um, very sensitive radiometer flew
Speaker:over the top of it and it went spining.
Speaker:There you go.
Speaker:And so they went and looked at the rocks and went, oh, there's not enough
Speaker:uranium there to be, uh, interesting.
Speaker:But, uh, another geologist came along and went, ah, there's
Speaker:some rare earths in that.
Speaker:And, but it took us, we've been going for, uh, you know, twen 20 plus years to
Speaker:work out and crack the Rosetta stone of how to process this particular or body
Speaker:and how much it is there and where it is, and all those fun, other fun things
Speaker:you do in mining, um, to actually work out how to get the rare earth out of it
Speaker:in a, in a, in a cost effective manner.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:Reminds me of Black Panther, you know, looking for vibranium.
Speaker:Oh, look, no, this stuff is way more fun than vibranium.
Speaker:And you know, I, you, you, you do have the advantage of seeing me.
Speaker:You can imagine me in a, in a, in a tight leather suit.
Speaker:Oh, there's a reason I'm an engineer.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Better move the conversation more quickly from that.
Speaker:I, I think that, go ahead.
Speaker:Sorry.
Speaker:No, I was just gonna say, if this is more interesting than vibranium, then
Speaker:this just got like 1000% more core.
Speaker:It, it, it's probably worth explaining, um, the role that Afuera played in
Speaker:that value chain, which takes you from going from a rock in the ground all
Speaker:the way through to that magnet, which I was buying in a hardware store.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Or the magnet, which goes into an electric vehicle.
Speaker:The.
Speaker:First of all, you've got to get that rock out the ground.
Speaker:And Stuart mentioned that already.
Speaker:It's a, it, it's the same as mining anything else.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Um, in the example of Noland, no pit mine, then there is the processing.
Speaker:And Stuart I'm sure will delve into more detail in all the different
Speaker:depth within the processing.
Speaker:But the interesting thing about the, the Nolans project, which are fur is running,
Speaker:and it's not just a mining project.
Speaker:It's not just getting the rock out the ground, it's actually doing the refining
Speaker:and the processing up until you get to the point where you have N D P R oxide.
Speaker:So you haven't got the metal yet, but you've got the oxide.
Speaker:Um, and then that goes to a facility where it goes through an electrolysis
Speaker:process, which turns it into metal, and then from there the metal is
Speaker:manufactured into the magnets.
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:And then that goes off into the, uh, equipment or whatever
Speaker:the end use of it is though.
Speaker:Um, when you, we, we, we talk about Aurura and the Nolans project of the
Speaker:mining project, but that's actually.
Speaker:It's not really a mining project, it's much more of a project.
Speaker:May, maybe you wanna say a bit more on that for that?
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Look and, and look, max is dead right there.
Speaker:You know, Nolans is, uh, probably only about 15% or 10% of, of what we are
Speaker:doing at Nolans is actually mining.
Speaker:You know, um, we, we have what I would consider in the mining industry, uh,
Speaker:a very small baby mine off to the side, um, to the point where it's
Speaker:so small in the early years when, when I talked about the fact that we
Speaker:were outcropping, we don't even mind continuously for the first 10 years of
Speaker:the project, we mined for a couple of years, stockpile and then come back in
Speaker:a couple of years time after that, after we were in processing off stockpiles.
Speaker:So we, we don't really mine continuously even, but when we get to the processing
Speaker:plant, you know, max glossed over said one big processing plant.
Speaker:But really we go through several, multiple different stages now.
Speaker:All rare earth deposits are slightly different.
Speaker:So they all have different processes and, but I can talk about the Nolan's process.
Speaker:So the first stage we go through is what we call beneficiation, where we, we are
Speaker:physically separating the good bits of the awe from the bad bits of the awe.
Speaker:And, and from that we get about 40% of the awe goes into what we call a concentrate.
Speaker:Um, so now we've gone from say, 3% total rare earths to maybe
Speaker:seven or 8% total rare earths.
Speaker:We then take that and because of some of the, the specialties in our
Speaker:product, we then leach that, that a, in phosphoric acid because we have
Speaker:a phosphate hosted awe that actually releases more phosphate into the
Speaker:phosphoric acid than what we started with.
Speaker:The stuff that doesn't Leach has got all the rare earths in it.
Speaker:So we then collect the leech residue, filter that, and, and keep that
Speaker:as a, as a a, um, as a, a feeding into the next phase of the project.
Speaker:But because of our awe being a phosphate, we regenerate our phosphoric
Speaker:acid and we actually reuse that in the front end to re leach them more.
Speaker:Concentrate, of course, we produce a bit of excess phosphoric acid, so in the, as a
Speaker:byproduct, we make phosphoric acid product and we send that off to other customers
Speaker:who then use that to make fertilizers.
Speaker:So, you know, we're trying to get everything we can out of the awe that we
Speaker:have, which I think is a really important part of, of modern mining, is you always
Speaker:want to get the most value from what you, what you're digging up out of the ground.
Speaker:Once we have the the residues, we then use what I like to call
Speaker:the metallurgical big hammer.
Speaker:So we mix that with sulfuric acid, concentrated sulfuric
Speaker:acid, and we heat it up.
Speaker:What that does is turn all of the minerals in there from a
Speaker:phosphate mineral into a sulfate.
Speaker:Um, and, and you know, this stuff is highly corrosive.
Speaker:We've also got some flu in there, so you're getting HF gas coming off,
Speaker:which we have to capture and deal with.
Speaker:So we, so we don't have any, any, any bad effects on anyone that works there.
Speaker:And then we can drop that into water, chilled water in our case,
Speaker:to drop all of the rare earths into solution as a rare, rare sulfate.
Speaker:Um, once we do the solid liquid separation again, we can then, we then wanna
Speaker:precipitate out those rare earth sulfates.
Speaker:So we mix it with methanol and that changes the solubility and we get
Speaker:rare earth sulfate precipitating out and we leave a lot of the thorium
Speaker:behind, which is a really good thing cuz we don't want the thorium.
Speaker:We want to deal with that and impound that and put that safely to the.
Speaker:Once we have the rare earth sulfate in solution, we then convert that to a
Speaker:hydroxide, refine that a little bit using some magnesia, and then we leach out
Speaker:the near the non-I rare earths from the rare earth hy mixed rare earth hydroxide
Speaker:to produce a rare earth chloride.
Speaker:So there's a lot of chemistry going on.
Speaker:There's a lot of equipment going on, there's lots of stages of add reagent
Speaker:precipitate or dissolve something.
Speaker:Filter it out, take take one of them, throw something away.
Speaker:And then we do the final stage, which is separation, where we take those
Speaker:rare earth chloride liquors and we separate out into birth FO first are
Speaker:heavy and mid rare earths, which is only a minor component of what we do.
Speaker:We separate out a pure N D P R oxide solution, and then we leave the rest.
Speaker:The lanum just goes to tails in our case.
Speaker:We then precipitate out the rare earths we oxalic acid to produce once we calcine it.
Speaker:A rare earth oxide that is 99.9% N D P R oxide.
Speaker:So it's a, it's a, a big complex chemistry set.
Speaker:And, you know, the Nolan's processing plant, for example, is about 1.3
Speaker:kilometers long by 700 meters wide.
Speaker:So it's as big as the central business district of the, of Darwin, which is the
Speaker:capital city of the Northern Territory.
Speaker:So we're, we're probably gonna have to get some bikes to get around
Speaker:there, I think, once we get there.
Speaker:But we'll use electric bikes.
Speaker:So we've got some rare earth magnet motors in those electric bikes.
Speaker:Well, maybe scooters.
Speaker:They seem to be the big thing at the moment.
Speaker:Um, and, and Stuart, if the, if the chemical engineer by background,
Speaker:he, he can talk about the chemistry.
Speaker:I came to this project looking at it from an energy and emissions perspective.
Speaker:So I basically think of all the words that Stuart just said,
Speaker:and then the loss of energy.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And, and it is a massive amount of energy we need to put in both
Speaker:in terms of, um, electricity.
Speaker:You know, we, with all those, all those processes we're talking about are using
Speaker:a lot of electricity, but also steam, we use a massive amount of steam, you know,
Speaker:some 200 odd tons an hour of, um, low pressure steam just to heat things up.
Speaker:So a lot of our processes, heating things up, cooling things down as well.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:I, I did some thumbs a little while ago on the amount of, uh,
Speaker:amount of steam you're generating.
Speaker:And it was something like boiling an, uh, an Olympic size swimming pool.
Speaker:Cause everything should be Olympic size swimming.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:Um, e every eight hours or something.
Speaker:It was, it was an enormous amount of energy that you're putting
Speaker:in to create all that steam.
Speaker:Oh, wow.
Speaker:Uh, that, that's actually pretty inherent in any rare earth extraction process.
Speaker:It, it, uh, it, it takes a lot of energy.
Speaker:We're gonna talk about energy transition, and this is the use
Speaker:of energy which is required.
Speaker:I looked up some figures recently published by the International Energy
Speaker:Agency, the iia a and that talked about an average for Neodymium, which is one
Speaker:of our products of, um, 76 kilograms which jump into emissions now 76 kilogram
Speaker:of, um, CO2 equivalent per kilogram of product, which is produced for nd Nearium.
Speaker:Um, and that compared to, um, if I were to look at the stat, uh, a
Speaker:much lower number for iron steel.
Speaker:So iron steel would be around 1.5 kilograms per kilogram, so, you know,
Speaker:nearly, nearly 50 times as much.
Speaker:Um, which just says something about the, um, energy and, and at the
Speaker:moment emissions intensity, cuz the majority of, of Stuart mentioned,
Speaker:the majority of railroading is happening in CH China right now.
Speaker:Um, and the electricity, which they'll be using, will be coming
Speaker:from a electricity grid, which we'll still have the significant.
Speaker:Coal component to it, although the Chinese grid is becoming greener.
Speaker:Um, which then takes us into the challenges around doing the Nolans project
Speaker:in a way which is consistent with a fur's goals to achieve net zero by 2050.
Speaker:. Yeah, and I think it's, it's worth pointing out too, you know, net zero isn't
Speaker:the only goal that we have at Afuera.
Speaker:You know, I mean, we, we want to, we want to hit the best standards.
Speaker:We want to become an industry leader in esg.
Speaker:So, you know, central Australia, you think about as being a bit of a boring old
Speaker:place, full of a desert, but it's actually an interesting ecosystem out there.
Speaker:And, you know, water is very precious.
Speaker:So we use it all that steam, we use a lot of water as well, but we've gotta
Speaker:conserve water and, and, you know, we've got the aboriginal heritage in
Speaker:the area, um, that we wanna make sure that we preserve and, and, and we wanna
Speaker:provide benefit for the local communities and the, and the indigenous people.
Speaker:So, E s g of all kinds is really important to us.
Speaker:And, and you know, I think mining is a, an inherently unsustainable activity.
Speaker:You, you have an all body, you dig it outta the ground, it's gone.
Speaker:How can that be sustainable?
Speaker:Um, you know, but I think what we're targeting, and, and this is not
Speaker:unique to Afuera, I mean, I think a lot of the world's mining companies,
Speaker:uh, you know, certainly the ones I have anything to do with in Australia
Speaker:are all starting to think this way.
Speaker:We know that there will be impacts from mining, but we need to make sure that
Speaker:we maximize the benefits to the greater community and minimize those impacts.
Speaker:And, and you know, as Max pointed out, carbon footprint is a, is a
Speaker:big issue with rare earth mining.
Speaker:So it's probably one of our biggest challenges.
Speaker:So maybe you can walk us through some of the, your actions that
Speaker:you're taking in regards to E S G and how you are doing things better
Speaker:and, uh, you'll make it useful.
Speaker:Uh, efficient use of, um, resources, energy, and also.
Speaker:Um, taking care of, , of the people.
Speaker:Well, I think one of the key parts there is, you know, we are doing all
Speaker:our processing from all right through to a rare earth oxide on one site.
Speaker:And, and that allows us to really take charge and responsibility for
Speaker:all of our waste and pro byproduct and, and, and tailing streams, you
Speaker:know, and, and by doing that, we're not shipping the problem off overseas.
Speaker:You know, a lot of rare earths and, and because of chemistry, um, which I won't
Speaker:delve into, rare earths always come with a little bit of radio activity.
Speaker:So, you know, managing that radio activity and impounding that radioactivity in a
Speaker:responsible manner is probably one of our most important things we need to do.
Speaker:The other big thing is obviously biodiversity.
Speaker:Making sure that we, we, you know, we have a couple of species
Speaker:on site, the black-footed rock wallaby, the great desert skin
Speaker:called the western desert skin.
Speaker:I can never remember which skin it is.
Speaker:Um, yo know is onsite and the malara, you know, so we are very careful to map those
Speaker:out and understand where, where they are so that we don't impact on their habitats.
Speaker:Um, you know, and the aboriginal heritage, you know, it's, it's not, it's not rock
Speaker:art on walls of caves and things like that, which some of our mining company
Speaker:brethren haven't done so well with.
Speaker:Um, but, you know, there, there is, there is, there is some aboriginal heritage
Speaker:there that goes back many, many years.
Speaker:Um, you know, and, uh, when we did our cultural awareness, uh, session, uh,
Speaker:a couple of years back, you know, one of the things that was really ramped
Speaker:home to me is that, you know, in the, in the day the aboriginal people
Speaker:were always in touch with the ground.
Speaker:They slept on the ground.
Speaker:They walked on the ground.
Speaker:They didn't have shoes.
Speaker:So the, the, the land is their, is their history.
Speaker:The land is a big part of who they are.
Speaker:So, You know, we need to, basically everything we do, we are thinking
Speaker:about, well, where are the cultural sensitivities in this area?
Speaker:How do we make sure that their story of the land, um, goes on?
Speaker:But at the same time, they can be part of a big participant in this project so
Speaker:that, you know, they can get jobs, they can get, you know, um, uh, benefits from
Speaker:the project as we ex, as we exploit the natural resources of the land, um, to, to
Speaker:lift them up and, and drive that social change that comes with economic change.
Speaker:Um, maybe, if you would be worth touching on how, uh, if we talked
Speaker:about the different kinds of E F G, you've been in the project for five
Speaker:years now, and it's been going longer.
Speaker:H how do you think the views of stakeholders have changed
Speaker:over, over time on that?
Speaker:What have you seen?
Speaker:Yeah, look, I mean, I've been in the mining industry
Speaker:now for well over 30 years.
Speaker:Um, you know, uh, I'm, I'm much older than what I look, um,
Speaker:especially in Black Panther suits.
Speaker:Um, but, uh, uh, I can't help but make a joke.
Speaker:Um, look, I have seen an amazing change in the last 30 years.
Speaker:Um, you know, 30 years ago when I joined the mining industry, I'll, I'll
Speaker:be blunt, e even the environment side of things wasn't of great interest.
Speaker:Um, whereas nowadays, and, and then, and then for a long time
Speaker:environment became very important.
Speaker:Um, but, but nowadays I think that, you know, everybody's starting to realize
Speaker:that everything we do, every action we take, um, you know, we need to think about
Speaker:what the impacts of those actions are.
Speaker:We need to make sure that everybody gets an opportunity to participate in,
Speaker:in this industry as much as we can.
Speaker:We need to make sure there's diversity.
Speaker:I mean, all, all of those really important things.
Speaker:And, you know, we went through a process in a few, a couple of years
Speaker:back where we looked at what's important to our stakeholders.
Speaker:Um, you know, and greenhouse gases is, is was probably the,
Speaker:the first one on the list.
Speaker:You know, that, that is so important.
Speaker:Um, yeah, and what, what, what I find really interesting about that is,
Speaker:and I dunno what Max's experience has been in, in industry, is that
Speaker:in Australia, at least anyway, we don't have a big government driving
Speaker:greenhouse gas, um, improvements and decarbonization down our throats.
Speaker:Um, you know, we've, we've had maybe a government that was, you know, less active
Speaker:in that space, but the mining industry particularly has got on with it anyway.
Speaker:You know, the number of mines that you'll see in, in Western Australia, in
Speaker:the rest of Australia that has a wind farm or a solar farm and a battery, you
Speaker:know, they're not fully decarbonized, but they're, they're on that journey.
Speaker:And it's not because of legislation, it's because that's what people demand.
Speaker:You know, they demand action from people like us who are basically,
Speaker:you know, mining the, the country's resources and uh, and, and trying
Speaker:to lift everybody up with that.
Speaker:Well, that's beautiful.
Speaker:perhaps the, the striking part for me is how, um, cause what, what we're slowly
Speaker:seeing, or maybe not slowly, but what we're starting to see is the transition
Speaker:from, I mean, because initially when, when we talk about mining, all we talk
Speaker:about is what we're mining and what we can use, what we're mining for.
Speaker:Um, but it's quite interesting to see how the conversation is, is moving
Speaker:towards, well, if we're mining at all, we have to do it in the right way and in
Speaker:the way that it doesn't hurt, you know?
Speaker:Um, I mean, cuz why would we, why, why would we mine things from the earth that
Speaker:are useful to us and then sort of destroy ourselves in the process of doing that?
Speaker:It's like, it's like a good, bad situation.
Speaker:Um, but, but that's quite interesting to see and thanks for leading the way.
Speaker:Thanks for leading the way on that end.
Speaker:Um, And, and I know you've talked about a, a number of things
Speaker:that Rare Earth is, is used for.
Speaker:Um, and, and our audience is sort of used to very, uh, perhaps lower, lower, um,
Speaker:intellectually demanding conversations.
Speaker:Uh, you know, like roundabouts, we had a conversation about roundabouts last week
Speaker:and we were just talking about how it's better to have roundabouts instead of
Speaker:traffic lights, uh, , and stuff like that.
Speaker:And so, you know, switching to, or, you know, presenting this
Speaker:kind of conversation, which I find very, very interesting.
Speaker:Um, it's like, okay, if, if we wanted to join, if we had like people that
Speaker:wanted to perhaps contribute, Um, you know, it's like what can, what
Speaker:can people do, um, on their end?
Speaker:And one of the reasons I'm asking this is, cause, you know, when I, I
Speaker:saw your video Max, and you, you had a very interesting way of putting
Speaker:like personal responsibility and, you know, responsibility on many levels.
Speaker:And I think you, you give an interesting example about how you
Speaker:used energy in your swimming pool, um, and, and a lot of things like that.
Speaker:And that was quite interesting, which is, um, what is sort of leading to
Speaker:the question that I'm asking now.
Speaker:It's like, well, right, if people that are probably not so grounded in
Speaker:chemistry or like what are ways that our listeners can sort of contribute
Speaker:to the work that, that you're doing?
Speaker:I, I could have a bit of a stab at that.
Speaker:I, I think that you raise the really interesting point.
Speaker:When it comes to something like rarer.
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:Because no one, other than if you need magnets to hang a picture, go to the
Speaker:shop looking to buy a railroad, right?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:It, it's one of these things which for the consumer is really hidden.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Um, and the world that we live in is full of things like that.
Speaker:So I can, I can be the, the, the best that I think I can be in terms of
Speaker:reducing my personal carbon footprint by using less energy, uh, you know,
Speaker:driving less, et cetera, et cetera.
Speaker:At the same time, I'm sitting in a building right now, which is constructed
Speaker:of concrete, which has a significant footprint associated with it.
Speaker:Um, and I use infrastructure every day.
Speaker:And there's all these d um, upstream component to the supply chains
Speaker:and the things that I use and, and, um, some things you have some
Speaker:visibility of like things you buy in the supermarket and other things.
Speaker:You've got no visibility of whatsoever, though I think.
Speaker:One part of what people can do, and this is what, uh, me and others within
Speaker:the net there, a network who tries to do, is just to really educate yourself
Speaker:on where a, a consumer can have impact.
Speaker:Cuz I don't really buy into the narrative that it's, um, all about
Speaker:systemic change, which means it's up to someone else, government, whoever
Speaker:it is to solve the whole problem.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Systems are made of people and, um, people acting in certain ways, whether
Speaker:that be as consumers or or otherwise, um, is ultimately what impacts on
Speaker:systems and create systems change.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:But it, it's, it's not necessarily easy to know exactly where to turn and what
Speaker:difference is to make unless you educate yourself, which is why a podcast like
Speaker:this with a Carbon alma and the whole Carbon Al Almanac project in general is
Speaker:actually fantastic just for trying to build people's understanding of where the
Speaker:emissions in our world actually come from and where you've got points of leverage.
Speaker:. I, I, I guess if I could jump in there, max, I think, I think, you
Speaker:know, I think you're dead right.
Speaker:I think use less.
Speaker:That's, you know, that's, that's even as a, even as a dodgy, nerdy
Speaker:engineer, that's where I'm, I'm, I'm operating at the moment.
Speaker:But, you know, I, I think the other part of it is, you know, you're talking
Speaker:at Aji about getting involved in rare earths and how, how do you do that?
Speaker:And I think that that's where government does have a role to play.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Um, you know, these projects are hard to get up.
Speaker:They are big, they are complicated, and most of them are owned by
Speaker:relatively small companies.
Speaker:You know, when I, when I joined, um, Aira five years ago, you know, we were,
Speaker:we were probably about 10 or 12 people.
Speaker:Um, and, and the whole company is worth about 50 or 60 million
Speaker:staring down the barrel of trying to develop a now 1.6 billion project.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:So that is, that is an amazing task.
Speaker:It, it is insane.
Speaker:But, but if people care and, and people, people vote that, that, that counts.
Speaker:Um, hopefully.
Speaker:But, um, you know, then governments get on board and they do something about it.
Speaker:Now, AFU has been quite lucky.
Speaker:We've received support for up to, you know, 350 million Aussie dollars
Speaker:from the, the Australian government.
Speaker:Um, and, and just the other day, the, the German Export Credit
Speaker:agency agreed to guaranteed debt for us for up to 600 million us.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:Um, if we are selling rare Earths into the GE German manufacturing industry,
Speaker:so that is how governments, which really are hopefully the representative
Speaker:of the people and, and, and we'll hopefully have that little bit
Speaker:longer timeframe to look at things.
Speaker:That is, that is how people get involved in this sort of project.
Speaker:Because if, if we don't have the support of governments, if we, if we don't.
Speaker:Have the, the, the support of the people, then, then these
Speaker:sorts of projects won't happen.
Speaker:And, and getting the decarbonization that we wanna see happen with electric
Speaker:vehicles, with, you know, with, with wind turbines and all, all the other
Speaker:really, really good technologies that are developing at the moment, we, we won't
Speaker:have the raw ingredients to get it done.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:And so, um, this, this might be a bit of a recap, but also
Speaker:to emphasize what you said.
Speaker:And so the use of rare earth really helps us with decarbonization.
Speaker:Um, and to get that to be in as many places as possible, I mean, make it
Speaker:available for use, um, the government, the buying of the government is very helpful.
Speaker:And usually when the people are educated and they start to talk
Speaker:about things like this, then it picks the interest of the government.
Speaker:And the government is also.
Speaker:Um, is more like motivated or, uh, you know, because generally the
Speaker:government should seek the interest of people, um, and then they're
Speaker:able to give support on that end.
Speaker:And that's, that's very interesting.
Speaker:And, you know, starting with education makes it even more profound because it's
Speaker:sort of free is like, well if, if you are really interested in helping out,
Speaker:um, maybe let's start by educating, you know, like educate yourself,
Speaker:get some of resources like this.
Speaker:You don't need to get all the chemistry, but just like me, I mean, I've learned
Speaker:a lot having this conversation with you.
Speaker:and there's a lot of things I'm hearing for the first time, but definitely
Speaker:if I were to have a conversation with someone else, my, my conversation
Speaker:will be different because now I have a bit more knowledge about this.
Speaker:Um, and if, if that goes around, then it makes it very, very easy or well
Speaker:at least easier for, um, for us to get the buy-in of, of the government.
Speaker:Um, which is quite interesting.
Speaker:And so you wanna say something Max?
Speaker:Oh, I was just gonna say that, um, it's a, a lot of it is about identifying
Speaker:information sources you can trust as well.
Speaker:So we are in our world, which is obviously a wash with information.
Speaker:Uh, and not all of that information is even partially true.
Speaker:So what's good about a resource like the Carbon Almanac, um, is that it
Speaker:is something which is, it's, it's old school journalism in a way.
Speaker:You know, you, you, you presented all this research, which has then
Speaker:got references behind it and so on.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Um, so identifying those kinds of places that you can go to for information to
Speaker:help you understand how rare earth fit in or, or anything else's really important.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Um, there, for example, on the rare earth, there is a good report on
Speaker:critical mineral in general by the I e A.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Um, the International Angio Agency, which is well worth a read.
Speaker:Perhaps this would be a good point for me to jump in and
Speaker:talk a little bit more about the decarbonization plan that we have.
Speaker:Yeah, that'll be great.
Speaker:For the, the Nolans project.
Speaker:Is that okay?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Um, it, that in itself has been a, a, a whole story of its own on top of the very
Speaker:interesting story, the Nolans project, which Stewart's already talked about.
Speaker:We've already talked about the energy intensity associated
Speaker:with rare earth extraction.
Speaker:And I think it's fair to say when the Nolans project was originally
Speaker:conceived, it was a very different world to the world of today.
Speaker:So the, the project, if not connected to an electricity grid,
Speaker:um, but it is by a gas pipeline.
Speaker:And so it needs to use a lot of energy.
Speaker:And I think originally you would've looked at that gas pipeline and said, okay, well
Speaker:that, that's our thought of energy that.
Speaker:But awareness has moved on and the desire of our stakeholders and
Speaker:actually after the company to do things differently so that we are not
Speaker:creating the emissions associated with the combustion of fat gas in future,
Speaker:um, have really come to the fore.
Speaker:Our few went public with that in, I believe it was 2021 with
Speaker:a net 0, 20 50 commitment.
Speaker:Um, and then from there, it's been a lot of work within the company to figure
Speaker:out what, let, let's go from the bold commitment, which a lot of companies
Speaker:were making around that time, but it was still a big thing for this company
Speaker:to do, given its energy requirements.
Speaker:How do we go from there to make turning that into reality?
Speaker:And, and, and it was a really interesting conversation.
Speaker:I remember talking to our board of directors, max, and, and we were
Speaker:talking about, you know, are we gonna make this net 0, 20 50 commitment?
Speaker:And, and they turned around to me and said, oh, so do you think we can.
Speaker:. And, and I went, well, I reckon the, the first bit's fairly easy and
Speaker:the second bit, I think I know how we can do that, but you know, the
Speaker:last bit, we're just gonna have to take a bit of a leap of faith, make
Speaker:the commitment, and then go for it.
Speaker:And, and I think that's what it takes, you know, you don't have
Speaker:to know exactly how you're gonna get to the end of this journey.
Speaker:You just have to take the first step and, and make that commitment and Yep.
Speaker:And it was really interesting and they took me in my word
Speaker:and so now we've gotta deliver.
Speaker:Hence Max, hence me.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So that, that got me involved in the project.
Speaker:So I, I started in the project, um, nearly a year ago now, and, and it
Speaker:started with just understanding what the emissions of the project were.
Speaker:So what are the big drivers of emissions?
Speaker:And we've already touched on that.
Speaker:And if it's not, it's not the mining, although we will be using
Speaker:for big mining trucks, but that's a relatively small percentage of
Speaker:the emissions likely to be created.
Speaker:Um, it's much more about.
Speaker:The electricity, which you require to feed the processing facility, but also
Speaker:the thermal energy requirements for the steam that you're trying to make
Speaker:in this processing facility as well.
Speaker:Um, and there are a number of different ways in which you can
Speaker:do that if you're using gas.
Speaker:So you can generate electricity in a, in an engine, um, or a gas turbine.
Speaker:Um, and then you might be able to use some of that heat to
Speaker:generate some of your steam.
Speaker:You will might also need to supplement that with a boiler, which is just
Speaker:like a big kettle basically, uh, to create additional steam as well.
Speaker:And all of that, all of that burns gas.
Speaker:Um, so once we'd understood that, that was where the majority of the emissions were
Speaker:coming from, what we call the stationary power, then we started to look around
Speaker:at what the different options were to do that in a different way in the future
Speaker:so that we weren't relying on that gas combustion and creating the emission.
Speaker:Um, and that was the point where you get so many different ideas thrown at you.
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:Because everyone's listening to things in the news all the time.
Speaker:We fit on in an office here with, um, 50 engineers.
Speaker:Everyone's got their own pet idea.
Speaker:Um, and that actually creates this almost paralysis about
Speaker:not knowing which way mm-hmm.
Speaker:To turn next.
Speaker:And I think a lot of companies were going through that process
Speaker:at the same time as well.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:So we realized when this came out of a conversation between me and Stuart,
Speaker:that we needed to be systematic about how we lifted through these options.
Speaker:And we needed to come up with a way in which we could decide what combination
Speaker:of different stings was going to get us to the net zero emissions,
Speaker:which we were targeting by 2050.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Um, reducing them in a way along the way 23rd, 2040, which we were
Speaker:happy with, which also delivered the best value to the company.
Speaker:So what was the lowest cost leaf toif wave of doing this?
Speaker:And you can't look at all the options cuz as, as soon as you start considering
Speaker:whether or not you're going to use hygiene as a fuel, uh, whether or not you're
Speaker:going to, what you're gonna do with renewable electricity and wind on site.
Speaker:Um, more out there ideas like.
Speaker:People were talking at the time about small modular nuclear react
Speaker:cause all kinds of stuff like that.
Speaker:Yeah, there you go.
Speaker:But there were just too many options to get your head around to compare
Speaker:everything with everything else.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Um, so we took a pathway development approach where we looked at, well,
Speaker:what are the credible different things that we could bring together
Speaker:and introduced progressively over time, which would get us to net zero.
Speaker:Can we come up with a representative, a handful, number of those pathways,
Speaker:which would enable us to understand what the range of different solutions
Speaker:were and what the likely cos were.
Speaker:And, uh, we were helped out in that by, uh, a local government department here
Speaker:called the Minerals Research Institute of WA had done some really, really good
Speaker:work on a, that you could follow to do that and do that kind of analysis.
Speaker:Um, and then the fun bit was coming up with what are these different technologies
Speaker:we'd stitch together, um, and all of.
Speaker:Eventually led to us making some decisions, which we put out as a relief
Speaker:to the market in January this year, where we described what our, our pathway to
Speaker:get to net zero by 2050 was going to be.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:And, and that's interesting to see.
Speaker:Uh, I mean, the first signal that I get is that, you know, you care, you care
Speaker:enough to not just make bold decisions.
Speaker:Cause I mean, if you go through the Carbon Almanac, one of the things that
Speaker:was also discussed there is greenwashing.
Speaker:Um, and greenwashing is basically organizations making very bold
Speaker:claims that they care well, that they either care nothing about, or
Speaker:not making efforts to actualize.
Speaker:Um, and, and so we see a lot of that.
Speaker:The Daily Difference published an article one time and they made a
Speaker:list of companies that were actually greenwashing and those companies simply
Speaker:said, Hey, we're carbon neutral or, We're reducing our carbon, you know,
Speaker:emissions by 80% in the next five years.
Speaker:And they're not making any effort towards getting that done.
Speaker:And, you know, that's a, that's, you know, that's a question of commitments because,
Speaker:you know, following your conversation and going through the promise that you've
Speaker:made to even publishing the pathway to making that possible, or your strategy
Speaker:for actualizing that is really, really beautiful to see for a company that mines,
Speaker:as a matter of fact, cause it's like, well we're doing a lot of work mining already.
Speaker:Can we just focus on that?
Speaker:Um, but you know, just listening to you is quite, you know, it
Speaker:makes me hopeful that perhaps there are a couple other organizations,
Speaker:you know, trying to do the same.
Speaker:Um, and, and I think I, I think there are a lot doing it.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Go.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I, I was just gonna say Ji, you know?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I mean, realistically you'd think, oh, we're gonna decarbonize, it's
Speaker:gonna cost us all this money.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:So what, what about our shareholders?
Speaker:But, but I think what jumped out of this and, and it, and it almost, I guess I
Speaker:kind of half suspected it, but it, it, it was a really, really pleasant surprise
Speaker:when we, when we did the analysis and we looked at the cost is, you know,
Speaker:if, if we developed the projects in, in line and, and we don't have great big
Speaker:technical problems when we're starting up the plant, um, you know, I mean, for
Speaker:the first sort of, you know, 15 years of operation of our project by decarbonizing,
Speaker:by going down that pathway now, we won't get all the way to zero in that first
Speaker:15 years we'll actually save money.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:So, so not only are we doing the right thing, we're gonna
Speaker:save some money doing it.
Speaker:And that's because that's the same story which have played out in
Speaker:electricity grids all around the world.
Speaker:You know, solar PV and onshore wind turbines are at a price point now
Speaker:where once you've raised the capital to install them, you then you're getting
Speaker:electricity for free, basically.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Um, and so, um, if you can harness that electricity at the time
Speaker:that it's available, then it's very likely to be lower cost
Speaker:than the fossil fuel alternative.
Speaker:And, and that's what we found, uh, the, the challenging bit and the
Speaker:more, uh, interesting technically bit, I suppose from, from the work I
Speaker:did on the, on a pathway development with what comes after that.
Speaker:So once you've got to the point where you've introduced these electrical
Speaker:renewables, so solar, definitely, we're in the middle of the Northern Territory.
Speaker:There's a lot of sunshine available to you for eight hours a day.
Speaker:Wind, probably some batteries that store that energy that'll
Speaker:take you to a certain point, but you've still got a big requirement
Speaker:around the generation of theme.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Um, and what happens when the, uh, sun isn't shining, when
Speaker:you've had a few cloudy days in the, in a row and, and no wind.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Um, that led to us considering more innovative solution, uh, things like
Speaker:concentrated folo thermal, uh, which is probably worth a quick deviation down.
Speaker:If, if you don't mind taking a minute or two on it just to describe
Speaker:what it is for your listeners.
Speaker:Uh, so concentrated folo thermal is, is basically the equivalent of taking a
Speaker:magnifying glass, uh, putting it in the sun and using that to heat up a pile of
Speaker:leaves from the ground and set it on fire.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:So it, it, it's nothing to do with generating.
Speaker:Energy from the sun using a photovoltaic panel, which is a normal solar panel.
Speaker:Instead it's concentrating the rays of the sun into one particular place, so
Speaker:you make something really, really hot.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And normally that's some sort of, uh, working fluid, which you can
Speaker:move past this hot place and then go and do useful things with.
Speaker:Often it's molten salt, it can be oil as well.
Speaker:Um, when we looked at that, we found that a very cost effective solution
Speaker:for us because we could take this molten salt and then we could use that
Speaker:to heat water and create the steam.
Speaker:And that whole process is actually remarkably efficient.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:Um, and the, and the great thing about that molten salt is you can
Speaker:also have a big, big fats of it, uh, which means which stay hot.
Speaker:So you can heat up this stuff during the day, and then you can have
Speaker:it fitting there at night, still warm, still generating that steam.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:So we think that has a big potential part to play in the future of the,
Speaker:of the decarbonization of the plant.
Speaker:And, and that's, it's very particular about our project that we have this.
Speaker:Thermal demand.
Speaker:Um, but at, but at the end of the day, one of, one of the hardest parts for us,
Speaker:and we're, we're the, where we're gonna want technology to really come to us a
Speaker:little bit more, um, is, is around that final bit of firming that last, maybe
Speaker:it's 10%, maybe it's 5%, I don't know.
Speaker:But we are still at the moment, we're going, okay, we're still gonna burn gas
Speaker:for that bit until we get some decent, um, some, some decent technology coming
Speaker:to us and, and, and look looking at the way things are going in the world.
Speaker:I'm fairly comfortable with that.
Speaker:You know, I think, I think there's, there's things we haven't even
Speaker:thought about yet that that'll be part of our final solution.
Speaker:Yeah, that's right.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:But, but I'm sure that you, you would actually figure it out because, um, I, I
Speaker:think it was yesterday, uh, I was, I was reading an article and it says, right,
Speaker:we really don't need the answers as much as we need to ask the right questions.
Speaker:And if we're asking the right questions, then we're down the path.
Speaker:To getting the answers.
Speaker:And it's like, well, if the problem is not solved, chances are we're
Speaker:not asking the right questions.
Speaker:Or, you know, perhaps we do not even, uh, carry in the way that
Speaker:we should to solve the problem.
Speaker:So, just listening to you asking this questions and, you know, sort
Speaker:of painting what the part might look like, it's sort of like an assurance
Speaker:that you would actually figure it out.
Speaker:Like all the technology that we have are here because people were asking questions
Speaker:that led to some of those solutions.
Speaker:So I have zero doubts that, that you figure it out and that's, that's, um,
Speaker:that's also like kudos to you for all the really great work that you're doing
Speaker:and the way that you're thinking about, um, you know, your technology and, and
Speaker:all the, the work that you're doing.
Speaker:Leaky has asked me to ask a question.
Speaker:Um, and so I'm, I'm just gonna ask that right now.
Speaker:And so she says, how How to connect rare earth production from the
Speaker:project with real life usage and for how long or how much supply.
Speaker:Um, I guess we could answer that in terms of what the future
Speaker:outlook for the Ferrero looks like.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Um, the, would you like to, uh, yeah, I was gonna say like the, the projected
Speaker:data that we, we have looking at it and, and bearing in mind that every
Speaker:electric vehicle has, has got about 1.8 to two kilos of rare earth oxide in it.
Speaker:Um, you know, interestingly, only about a kilo of that is
Speaker:actually in the drive motor.
Speaker:The rest is in electric windows and all those other, you know, power
Speaker:steering and fun things we have.
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:Um, So, so we we're, we're, we're talking about Nolans, which is
Speaker:gonna produce about four and a half thousand tons a year of N D P R oxide.
Speaker:And each car has got a kilo, uh, one, just say two kilos in it.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:And we're producing four and a half thousand tons.
Speaker:If you go, if you go to a wind turbine, a wind turbine, uh,
Speaker:might have say 150 kilos in it.
Speaker:So, so we are talking about a lot.
Speaker:However, if you look at the supply and demand from the world, we need
Speaker:between now and I think it's 2040, um, about 11 projects just like
Speaker:Nolan's around the world to supply that extra demand that's coming.
Speaker:Um, you know, the great thing about Nolans, um, and, and you know, also
Speaker:Mount World, which is another, the only rare Earths project, integrated
Speaker:project outside of, uh, China.
Speaker:Um, they both have very long life mine.
Speaker:Um, we have about 38 years in our life of mine at the moment.
Speaker:But we've also done drilling on site that takes the or body down
Speaker:to 400 meters deep, which is double the depth of our currently pan pit.
Speaker:So, you know, we're, whilst we've got 38 years in our, in our, in our, um,
Speaker:economics at the moment, we're, we're looking at a project that I think will
Speaker:be there for, you know, 60, 70 years.
Speaker:And, and one of the great things about that, and I know for me this
Speaker:is really important and, and a lot of the people who work for me, a lot
Speaker:of the boring, you know, nasty mining types and engineers really believe
Speaker:in this, is that having such a long life of mine and operating in central
Speaker:Australia where, you know, life is tough.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Um, you know, we, we have an opportunity to make intergenerational change for the,
Speaker:for the local people out there, for the communities, for the indigenous people
Speaker:and, and, you know, actually add a lot of value to the community out there, which
Speaker:is, that's, that's really exciting, you know, and, uh, if you ever get a chance
Speaker:to go to Central Australia, take it.
Speaker:It's, it's a, it's a unique part of the world.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:I'm, I'm taking that.
Speaker:Well, I'm hoping to go there some way someday in, oh, sorry.
Speaker:I was gonna say, I'm hoping to go there one day and see, um, a lot
Speaker:of, uh, sailor farms, wind turbines, um, concentrated sailor thermal.
Speaker:Well, I think you're young enough.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:Thank you.
Speaker:Uh, max, do, do you wanna, do you wanna say something?
Speaker:Do you wanna add, um, any thoughts to that?
Speaker:Uh, yeah, either, the only thing I'd go back to is your point about asking the
Speaker:right question, and it's only sometimes in delving deep into the detail of these
Speaker:kinds of problems that you've start to understand what the right question is.
Speaker:Stuart mentioned firming power.
Speaker:That was something that I knew about as a concept, that you needed
Speaker:something when you didn't have the renewable resources available.
Speaker:But I went through a process of education in looking at detailed modeling of what
Speaker:the future of this project was like to look like once we introduced some
Speaker:renewables to really understand the importance of this farming in question.
Speaker:Because if you've got variable wind and, and variable solar, even when
Speaker:you install lots and lots of energy storage, it's just a, it's a statistical
Speaker:fact that because of the variability of the input, at some point you are
Speaker:gonna run out of the energy which you require from your renewable sources.
Speaker:And so once you understand that, that means you started to frame the problem on
Speaker:what this firming power looks like, that it's something which you need to give
Speaker:you potentially quite a lot of energy if you don't want to turn off your big
Speaker:chemistry fat very, very infrequently and increasingly infrequently.
Speaker:And it's a really, really interesting challenge.
Speaker:And it's not one which is perfectly solved yet, but I think the framing of, to your
Speaker:point, the framing of it, the challenge.
Speaker:Means that we can then put that out to lots of very smart engineers
Speaker:over the next 5, 10, 15 years.
Speaker:And I have no doubt as well that we'll find a good solution.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:Thank you.
Speaker:Uh, there's another interesting question that leaky is asking here.
Speaker:And, and she, she says, is there a way to track better mining or better processing,
Speaker:um, rare earth in lifecycle assessment?
Speaker:And the reference she's making to this is that, um, it's the narrative that electric
Speaker:vehicles, you know, are not so efficient because of carbon emissions, uh, for
Speaker:the production of the electric vehicles.
Speaker:So it's like, you know, well we're not using, um, fuel to drive the vehicles,
Speaker:but how do we produce the vehicles?
Speaker:It's like one is upsetting the other.
Speaker:So, um, is there a better way to, to track the processing, um, of rare
Speaker:earth in, in life cycle assessment?
Speaker:I'm sure this two has something to say here, but I, the one thing I would say
Speaker:before that is that, um, is another example of where're checking a fact
Speaker:is really important because the, in the, in an electric vehicle, in the
Speaker:production of electric vehicle, it is true that the carbon footprint
Speaker:of the production will be greater.
Speaker:And you can go and find, N Nissan has got some quite good published
Speaker:data on this, for example, comparing a like for like internal combustion
Speaker:engine, carbon electric vehicle.
Speaker:But if you look at the lifecycle, even plugging into a pretty average
Speaker:electricity grid in terms of its carbon intensity, you're still definitely better
Speaker:off today in terms of the lifecycle emissions of that electric vehicle.
Speaker:Um, do I dunno if you wanna talk about rare Earth and how
Speaker:they fit into the life cycle?
Speaker:The, well, yeah, I, and I'd back up exactly what you said there, max.
Speaker:You know, I mean, I think that people forget about the, they, they don't, they
Speaker:don't do a, like for, like, they try and do a life cycle analysis on electric
Speaker:vehicles, but then they do, uh, just what you're burning and building analysis.
Speaker:They don't think about.
Speaker:The amount of energy used in oil and gas exploration and
Speaker:refining and fuel transport and all those fun things that we do.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Um, you know, but, but look, I think the interesting thing about it is, but
Speaker:particularly from rare Earth's point of view, um, you know, it's, it's
Speaker:actually a very, very small part of it.
Speaker:You know, as I, as I said before, every car has got about
Speaker:two kilos of rare earth in it.
Speaker:Now, every internal combustion engine car has got a kilo of rare earth in it.
Speaker:So, you know, we're only adding one more kilo, um, which is a
Speaker:doubling to, to make an electric vehicle versus the, um, the, uh, the
Speaker:internal combustion engine vehicle.
Speaker:But what that does give you is a 15% smaller battery for the same range.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:So, so rare earth is like that, that, that little secret source
Speaker:that makes it a little bit better.
Speaker:And means that electric vehicles have that better usability and that they can have
Speaker:a smaller footprint for the same range.
Speaker:Um, so I think, I think that's worth talking about.
Speaker:But look, life cycle assessment is something that we, we haven't done yet.
Speaker:We, we haven't looked at our full life cycle assessment.
Speaker:We, we've focused on our scope one and two emissions, you know what I mean?
Speaker:We, we, we've only just started construction of our project, so we,
Speaker:we've got a long way to go still too.
Speaker:But I think the life cycle assessment concept is, is a really
Speaker:valuable way of looking at things.
Speaker:You know, what we can do is, as we develop that, is we can use that to determine and,
Speaker:and make some of our supply decisions.
Speaker:So where are we getting our reagents from?
Speaker:Let's take into a account the fact that one of our, one of the things we want to
Speaker:do later in the project life is to look at making some of our own reagents on site.
Speaker:Now, that'll mean we'll need more energy, but we might be better off
Speaker:having that energy used on site.
Speaker:And then reducing the transport of things into site and reducing the
Speaker:manufacturing overseas of some of those chemicals that might be dirty.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:But we do it clean on site.
Speaker:So, you know, thinking about that overall footprint I think is really valuable.
Speaker:But I do think that the narrative of an unfair comparison, an apples and
Speaker:oranges thing that, that you read about and where people say, oh, rare,
Speaker:you know, electric vehicles are worse.
Speaker:Well, you know, I think, I think we've gotta, we've gotta get everybody making
Speaker:those smart informed decisions, getting the right, right, right answers there.
Speaker:Um, yeah.
Speaker:And you know, I mean, I'll go back to the other thing.
Speaker:Um, you know, the best way to use less, uh, have less footprint is to use less.
Speaker:You know, I mean, drive less and it doesn't matter what you're driving,
Speaker:you're having less footprint.
Speaker:Um, and I'm a dirty mining guy.
Speaker:You know, think about that for a second.
Speaker:I'm, I'm one of the bad guys that dig up the stuff outta the earth, you know?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Um, right, I, I, I think we pretty much have covered, um, you know, the things
Speaker:that we wanted to talk about in this, in this session, and I've totally enjoyed it.
Speaker:Um, but perhaps are there any challenges that you are facing with mining that
Speaker:you've not already talked about?
Speaker:Um, and you, you'd like to, you know, maybe throw some light on?
Speaker:Hmm, that's a good question.
Speaker:I, I, I can a answer it from the carbon perspective cuz I'm afraid that's the
Speaker:lens that I looked at everything through.
Speaker:Um, I, I talked earlier about how when this project was conceived, it was
Speaker:probably not with the emissions footprint so much in mind as it as it is today.
Speaker:I sometimes wonder, uh, perhaps this is a conversation for me and Stu over a
Speaker:beer, how, if you were starting from the beginning, what would you do differently?
Speaker:You know, how, how would, how would you, um, design the plant or the
Speaker:operations of the plant in a way which might make you to be able more flexible
Speaker:with your energy use, for instance.
Speaker:So when you are in those points where you've got less ringable
Speaker:power, how can you turn up and down?
Speaker:Um, and so I think, um, I think a challenge for us, and this is a
Speaker:challenge for the entire industrial world, really, is how do you
Speaker:make the best of what you've got?
Speaker:Because you're never starting from the i ideal situation.
Speaker:You've always got an existing asset or you've got a project which
Speaker:is progressive, a certain stage.
Speaker:Um, and, and so I think that's something that we'll probably
Speaker:just keep returning to.
Speaker:How do we just keep steering, steering our core to improve the outcome?
Speaker:And, and, and look, what, what I'd add to that, you know, is that whole
Speaker:idea that everything we do has a cost.
Speaker:You know, and I think that.
Speaker:And, and I'm not gonna go out on a limb and say, we need a
Speaker:carbon tax and a carbon price.
Speaker:But, but you know, if in reality if it's important enough, we need to
Speaker:act like that price is there anyway.
Speaker:And realize that, you know, carbon's not free.
Speaker:Water's not free.
Speaker:And, and, you know, if we are going to be living in this sustainability
Speaker:world that we wanna live in, where, where we consider the, the impacts
Speaker:of everything then, then even in the absence of a formalized governmental
Speaker:tax or something like that, we still gotta put a price on these things.
Speaker:And, and I think that's the thing that I'd do differently if I, if I went back
Speaker:and, and we, we had more time, more resources as well to develop Nolan's,
Speaker:um, you know, uh, my team, my team a year and a half, two years ago, I know three
Speaker:years ago was two and a half people.
Speaker:We are now 65 or 70 in my team.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:But what I, what I'd do differently is, is you would add all these extra cost layers
Speaker:in, into your analysis to understand what the true cost of it, not just the
Speaker:capital cost and the operating cost, but the other costs that layer into it.
Speaker:And, and I think that if we can get to that as, as an industrialized world
Speaker:and as a mining industry, then, then I think we'll be in a better place.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:I, I totally agree 100% with, with that, with that idea.
Speaker:Um, okay.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Um, so is there anything that, you know, you would like to talk about
Speaker:that we've not already talked about or you we're slowly rounding up, but, um,
Speaker:what else is cool that we've not, you know, had the chance to talk about?
Speaker:Or what would you like our listeners to know about what you're doing and,
Speaker:um, perhaps something they should keep at, at the back of their minds, um,
Speaker:or, you know, anything in that area?
Speaker:Oh, that's a good question.
Speaker:I think, I think I'm pretty talked out on that.
Speaker:Um, the, uh, I mean, you know, this podcast is, is around the Carbon
Speaker:Almanac and, uh, I, I just think it's a fantastic resource, though.
Speaker:I'm probably preaching to the converted if I tell the listeners to go and pick up a
Speaker:carbon album and I can flick through it.
Speaker:But it is, it's a really, it's a really good book and, and I found in the areas
Speaker:which I do know something about, so for example, the decarbonization of shipping,
Speaker:I mentioned my background, a ship designer, of course, they went straight
Speaker:to the page on the decarbonization of shipping out of this 500 page book
Speaker:or how big it is to see if I actually thought it stacked up and actually did.
Speaker:So that gave me great confidence that the other bits in the book, which I know
Speaker:less about, hopefully you telling me something, which is reasonably correct.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:That's great.
Speaker:Um, Stuart, you you wanna say something to it?
Speaker:Yeah, look, the, the, the only, the only thing I'd say and, and, and I think you.
Speaker:To, to, to live in interesting times and, uh, is the best thing.
Speaker:And, and I think we are in really, really interesting fun times because, you know,
Speaker:when, when the industrial Revolution kicked off and oil and gas became a thing,
Speaker:it was, it was such a step change from everything that came before it, that, you
Speaker:know, that was the solution you went to.
Speaker:That's, that's where energy came from.
Speaker:That was, it was the solution to every problem you had.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Where we are now, there, there is not one killer solution to solving this
Speaker:carbon problem that the world has.
Speaker:You know, it is a multimodal solution.
Speaker:And, and I think the work that, that, that Max and I did with, with, with Nolans
Speaker:shows that for Nolan's, you know, thermal energy and, and those things, that,
Speaker:that's works for us for another project.
Speaker:It's all about electron storage and elliptical energy.
Speaker:And, and I think that's the really cool thing as a, as a, as a nerdy
Speaker:engineer deep down that we get to throw these, these great ideas around.
Speaker:And, you know, I mean, the mining industry gets a bit of a bad rap.
Speaker:Um, you know, and yeah, and look, in some cases it deserves it.
Speaker:You know, there's, there's been things that, you know, I've
Speaker:seen over the years that aren't, aren't something to be proud of.
Speaker:But I think the mining industry is also part of the solution.
Speaker:You know, we are not gonna fix this through, through, you know,
Speaker:paper plates or versus, you know, bamboo plates and things like that.
Speaker:It's going to require effort from everybody.
Speaker:And that's all I could think of at the time.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:You know, it's gonna require effort from everyone and, and you know,
Speaker:I think that it's really cool that mining gets to be part of it.
Speaker:thank you, thank you so much for, for making mining sound so cool.
Speaker:Um, and that's what, that's what leaky says.
Speaker:I think there's so many cool things in this conversation.
Speaker:I think designing ships is cool.
Speaker:Like, I've not been able to get that out of my head since you said that Max.
Speaker:Like what?
Speaker:You design ships?
Speaker:That's a whole separate podcast.
Speaker:We're, we're gonna be talking about that later, max.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:That's something I like to do cuz I design, I'm like, well not, I've not
Speaker:designed ships, I've just designed, you know, maybe less technical
Speaker:stuff, but this is, this is, this has been really, really interesting.
Speaker:And leaky says that you guys rock.
Speaker:And I've had absolute fun.
Speaker:It's been so, it's been so great.
Speaker:I hope I, I know that our listeners would, would enjoy listening to this episode.
Speaker:It's like, well, we're throwing some science around, but you're having fun
Speaker:along the way and you're also learning what is critical and what is true.
Speaker:Um, pretty much from the horse's mouth, from the people that actually
Speaker:are deeply involved in this.
Speaker:And it's been an honor.
Speaker:Um, it's been an absolute honor to, um, to host you guys and have you talk about.
Speaker:You know, all this cool stuff.
Speaker:Um, Li's so excited.
Speaker:I'm sure if she, if she, uh, you know, had her camera on, she'd probably be
Speaker:clapping for you right now, but, um, I guess I'll do that on her behalf.
Speaker:Thank you so much for joining us.
Speaker:Thanks.
Speaker:Um, and I hope we, we get to do this sometime probably in, in the next couple
Speaker:of months or year to see some of the progress that you've also, that you've
Speaker:made and, um, to keep our listeners, um, you know, a bit bit more in the loop.
Speaker:And, and I, I look forward to doing that with you if you, if you don't mind.
Speaker:Um, excellent.
Speaker:Yeah, it's been a lot of fun.
Speaker:Much, um, and, and we'd love to come back on another time and, and
Speaker:give you that update on, on where we got to and where we're going.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:It's great looking, looking forward.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Thank you very much.
Speaker:Excellent.
Speaker:Great conversation.
Speaker:Cheers.
Speaker:Cheers.
Speaker:You've been listening to Carbon Sessions, a podcast with carbon
Speaker:conversations for every day.
Speaker:With everyone from everywhere in the world, we'd love you to join the Carbon
Speaker:sessions so you too can share your perspectives from wherever you are.
Speaker:This is a great way for our community to learn from your ideas and
Speaker:experiences, connect and take action.
Speaker:If you want to add your voice to the conversation, go to the carbon
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Speaker:This podcast is also part of the Carbon Almanac Network.
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