【Ferro-alloys.com】: An expert from the University of New South Wales (UNSW) has encouraged Australia to embrace its green metals opportunity or risk losing its strategic foothold on international trade.

The comments, made by Dr Rahman Daiyan at the COP30 Summit in Brazil, emphasised Australia’s early advantage in the greens metals race while advising that true opportunity lies in how the nation can transform what’s dug up.

Dr Daiyan – from the UNSW School of Minerals and Energy Resources Engineering – said Australia could ensure global demand was met by moving beyond its traditional mine-and-ship model and investing in downstream processing and low-carbon supply chain design.

Daiyan said at the Green Metals Forum that it was “less about the supply chain numbers” and more about “a dialogue – about what Europe needs and what Australia can provide” to coincide with a greater push for carbon neutrality and open the door for countries like Australia to benefit.

To capitalise on such a demand from international partners, change needs to be enacted in three stages, Daiyan said: understanding countries like Europe cannot produce clean energy at home; navigating political shifts to communicate with partners; and riding the “green metal wave”.

“A lot of the European companies which were initially thinking of having their own green iron production … realised it’s probably not going to happen,” Daiyan said.

“Taking green iron from Australia can potentially save you 263 petajoules of hydrogen import and 20 terawatt-hours of electricity annually. That energy can be used for what Europe does with specialty steel, to make their wind turbines and other advanced manufacturing where Europe enjoys competitive advantage.

“It allows us to have a bit of value addition for Australia. So, in that sense, it’s a win-win partnership.”

The comments come at a time where a greater push for the use of green metals is being seen domestically, with the Western Australian government noting green steel’s usage in upcoming key infrastructure projects.

• [Editor:Alakay]