A critical minerals processing facility slated for Perth has progressed to the next stage, with the Western Australian and federal governments committing $3 million to an initial feasibility study.
The study, announced on Tuesday, will investigate the $200 million common user facility first flagged last year to boost the state’s downstream processing potential amid efforts to reduce Australia’s reliance on Chinese critical minerals.
It will be led by the Minerals and Resources Institute of Western Australia, which is also behind the common user Critical Minerals Advanced Processing (CMAP) facility proposal.

The Western Australia government set aside $100 million for the facility in last year’s state Budget, but will rely on the federal government for a matched funding commitment.
The facility would contain pilot plant equipment, allowing small and medium-sized business to undertake downstream processing of critical minerals and strategic materials at a demonstration scale.
Announcing the study as China further tightened export controls on critical minerals in response to the escalating trade war with the US, federal Resource minister Madeleine King said the study was an important step towards building the local supply chain.
“Common user facilities are an important piece of the puzzle when it comes to growing our capacity to process our mineral resources here onshore to build a future made in Australia,” she said.
WA’s Mine and Petroleum minister David Michael welcomed the federal support for the study through the $10.2 million Critical Minerals National Productivity Initiative, and said the facility is key to capturing mode value onshore.
“The Cook government aims to capture more value onshore, with a particular focus on expanding our advanced processing capabilities and or ‘midstream’ industries,” he said on Tuesday.
“To achieve these ambitions, a CMAP facility capable of demonstrating critical minerals processing to a more advanced value-added stage, will lead to the development of greater onshore processing and manufacturing opportunities, over the next ten to twenty years.”
Chamber of Minerals and Energy WA acting chief executive Adrienne LaBombard welcomed progress on the facility, which allows for the “kind of economies of scale that is vital to moving WA down the production cost curve”.
But Ms LaBombard warned that the facility alone is now enough for Western Australia to attract the scale of investment required to seize the critical mineral processing opportunities on offer.
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