nt govt quiet on 300million deadline

http://www.ntnews.com.au/article/2008/08/27/5487_nt-business.html

NT Govt quiet on $300m deadline

ALISON BEVEGE

August 27th, 2008

THE Territory will know within six months whether it is to get a proposed $300 million rare earths processing plant - or lose it to South Australia.
Without guarantees of 150 megawatts of power supply and a suitable project site, rare earths and phosphate junior Arafura Resources has said it will have to shift its plans to build an ore processing complex and chemicals facility to South Australia instead of Darwin.

The project, including Incitec Pivot's proposed chemical supply plant, is expected to create up to 4000 jobs in the construction phase. But the NT Government would not give any details on power supply.

Chief Minister Paul Henderson's spokeswoman Rebecca Cass said power supply for the project was "an issue for the company''.

The publicly owned Power and Water Corporation also refused to say whether they could provide a further 150 megawatts of power.

When asked if the new Blacktip gas supply would be enough to power both Darwin and the chemicals complex, spokeswoman Judie Brennan said that information was "commercial in confidence''.

Leader of the Opposition Terry Mills said the Labor Government needed to get its planning processes right to guarantee adequate power and suitable land for industry - or economic development would be hampered.

Arafura Resources managing director Alistair Stephens told BusinessWeek the NT Government would need to give clarity soon.

The chemicals complex is to process ore from Arafura's Nolan's Bore project, 135km north of Alice Springs near Aileron.

At a time when other junior projects are struggling with tightened credit conditions, stock market woes and falling base metal prices, the project economics at Nolan's Bore have improved - thanks to soaring world fertiliser prices.

Mr Stephens said the project was expected to produce up to 200,000 tonnes of phosphoric acid per year.

"The price of phosphoric acid in India has gone from $400 per tonne when we did our pre-feasibility study to the latest deal of $2380 per tonne,'' he said.

"Australia is a net importer of phosphate so we're uniquely positioned to feed the Australian agricultural phosphate market.''