A huge day at work yesterday with not one opportunity to check...

A huge day at work yesterday with not one opportunity to check the phone for HC or stock prices, then to finish up and find both QPM in the green and a flurry of conversation on the thread was a great end to the week.

Carbon accounting & ESG comparisons are a headache topic for sure, as @Venge's post above highlights.
Keeping it simple and looking at the wider economy to include metallurgical coal's place in the global steel making industry, my view is the QPM process IS clearly carbon negative.
Using waste gas from Bowen Basin met coal mines for a large proportion of our energy needs to produce our products, this displaces the need for QPM (or anyone else) to otherwise generate that energy to make said products. BTW, our said products aren't something frivolous like cigarettes, but minerals essential to power clean energy machines.

In 2020, only around a quarter of the world's steel was made using electric arc furnaces (EAFs), the remainder still from traditional sources coal and coke. While the industry will undoubtably pivot towards EAFs, a significant proportion currently still plan to use coal-based blast furnace-basic oxygen furnaces (BF-BOF). IMO the push will intensify to eventually phase out coal completely, but that will be an incredibly expensive process, so we're stuck with it for some time yet. BB miners with some of the world's best met coal will perhaps be the last to exit.

Reading back through many of QPM's older announcements, perhaps the team's focus has evolved, but these would all contribute to far cleaner nickel than Indonesia, other than the focus on gas supply which has dominated comms since QPME's inception:
- 28/04/2021: Review of Renewable energy options in particular solar thermal for process steam, hydrogen solar power and cogeneration
- 05/11/2021: Updated Life Cycle Assessment confirmed all electricity requirements will come from renewable sources
- 29/11/2021: Hydrogen Supply MOU executed with Edify Energy, where hydrogen purchased from Edify’s large scale, green hydrogen production facility at Lansdown would supplement QPM’s gas supply. Also included supply of up to 4.2 x 106 Nm3of oxygen gas & ~4,000kL of waste water
- 15/12/2021: Use of hydrogen fueled trucks for ore/product haulage. Preso notes proximity to existing Ross River (140 MW) and future Edify (400MW) solar arrays
- 28/04/2023: Noting Safeguard Facilities must reduce their carbon emissions by 4.9% per annum from their Baseline; Coal and gas projects can’t buy carbon credits to offset their emissions

Today I woke to this news - is it huge or what? https://www.mining.com/web/us-takes-action-targeting-russian-aluminum-copper-and-nickel/
The United States on Friday prohibited metal-trading exchanges from accepting new aluminum, copper and nickel produced by Russia and barred the import of the metals to the U.S.
The Treasury Department said Friday’s action would prohibit the London Metal Exchange and Chicago Mercantile Exchange from accepting new Russian production of aluminum, copper, and nickel.
The share of Russian-origin copper stocks rose to 62% in March from 52% the previous month and the share of Russian nickel rose to 36% from 35% over the same period, the LME said.

Also overnight was an interesting development with the U.S. Trade and Development Agency (USTDA) supporting a grant to Eramen Minerals Inc. to develop an ore-to-nickel and cobalt processing plant in the Philippines. With the recent confirmation that the Philippines is still exporting ore to Indonesia, perhaps this shows the US will throw support behind its Pacific allies rather than indirectly supporting China through nickel deals with Indonesia?

With the above international news, upcoming pre-Budget announcements, QPME update and quarterly, perhaps we're about to turn the corner...have a good weekend all