The Port Hedland Green Steel project has progressed after Posco and DevelopmentWA agreed on the commercial terms over a 900-hectare site in the Pilbara.
South Korean steelmaker Posco, which will operate the project, and the state’s land development agency have agreed on key commercial terms of a potential long-term lease over land in the Boodarie strategic industrial area.
Posco chief executive and vice-chairman Hag-Dong Kim and Lands Minister John Carey attended a ceremony to mark the agreement, which was signed by acting DevelopmentWA chief executive Dean Mudford and Posco raw material department head Ji-Won Suh.
An Australian entity named Port Hedland Green Steel last month lodged plans for the iron ore processing facility in the Boodarie strategic industrial area.
The application came about nine months after the state government allocated land across the Pilbara's Boodarie and Ashburton strategic industrial areas for a pipeline of seven projects valued at $70 billion.
In a statement released today, Posco said the next steps to progress the Boodarie site would be an agreement of an option to lease over the area.
Mr Kim said green steel was a critical component in the company’s decarbonisation plans, with extensive studies into a Pilbara project being undertaken.
“The potential should not be underestimated,” he said.
“Our calculations are that the first stage alone of PHGS will achieve half of the emissions intensity for every ton of steel processed.
“Our interest in Port Hedland includes the proximity of reliable iron ore supplies, the availability of land and access to a major port.
“We need the land to grow the project and reach the scale that will deliver the large volumes of pellets and HBI created using renewable hydrogen, which we can then convert to green steel.”
The site, near Port Hedland, would be used for staged large scale downstream processing of Pilbara iron ore into pellets.
It would also be used to process hot briquetted iron transitioning from gas to renewable hydrogen.
Hot briquetted iron and pellets would be shipped to South Korea and other Asian countries for lower carbon and green steel production use, according to Posco.
