Australian $650m pulp mill planned

Pulp Mill for SA Plantation Gum Trees

Penola Pulp yesterday announced plans to build a AU$650 MILLION pulp mill west of Penola in the South East of South Australia, subject to government and council approvals. Penola is approximately 140 Kms south east of Kingston SE.

The project would generate more than 600 jobs during construction and employ 120 people permanently. It would produce 350,000 tonnes of pulp a year from about 700,000 tonnes of wood from locally grown blue gums.

A consortium of companies including Timbercorp, Orica, CellMark, Andritz and Silcar is supporting the project.

Penola Pulp project director John Roche said Australia imported $3 billion worth of pulp and paper a year and was at the same time the world's largest exporter of pulp chips.

Limestone Coast Regional Development Board chief executive Grant King said the announcement was "terrific news".

The project is expected to increase the value added to locally grown timber which is presently used for the less valuable wood chips exported mainly to Japan.

Original story By JEMMA CHAPMAN
18nov05

Read more at Advertiser Newspapers

Geothermal energy for South Australia

Electricity from four kilometers under the Otway Basin

Scopenergy, which aims to operate a $160 million geothermal power station off the Limestone Coast near Millicent in south-eastern SA, has entered into a long-term power purchase agreement with Snowy Hydro for 40MW of electricity. Geothermal power is generated from naturally occurring hot water.

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Mr Massey-Greene said the project had the potential to generate baseload power for the SA and national electricity markets. The proposed power station would use water from four kilometres underground, returning it after extracting the heat. There are 250 conventional geothermal electricity plants around the world, producing 8900MW of power.

Read more in The Age Newspaper