Olympic Dam Growth Precinct — Copper Refining & Reserve

One of the world's great ore bodies: sovereign copper refining and a copper reserve. Uranium stays mining-and-export unless a future civil-nuclear decision. A later-stage addition, not yet costed.

This page is part of Growing Australia. A fully-costed $190.1B sovereign industry and cost-of-living plan: five programs across 26 Growth Precincts.

Five sovereign industry pillars

• Powering Australia — sovereign fuel & energy ($71.9B)
• Making It Here — sovereign manufacturing ($38.0B)
• Cyber Australia — sovereign compute & connectivity ($29.2B)
• Feeding Australia — water, food, medicines ($30.2B)
• Our Neighbourhood — Pacific partnerships ($20.8B)
• Building Australia — factory-built homes, precinct housing factories

26 Growth Precincts

• Hunter Valley Growth Precinct — network flagship, advanced assembly
• Pilbara Growth Precinct — battery materials, direct reduced iron, hydrogen
• Gladstone Growth Precinct — green aluminium, critical minerals
• Townsville Growth Precinct — rare earth magnets, Pacific gateway
• Whyalla Growth Precinct — flagship pilot: green steel, titanium
• Kwinana Growth Precinct — chemicals, sovereign cells, chip packaging
• Tennant Creek Growth Precinct — sovereign fuel, power & compute
• Port Augusta Growth Precinct — grid stability & dispatchable solar
• Collie Growth Precinct — battery manufacturing, grid storage
• Henderson Growth Precinct — sovereign merchant fleet, AUKUS sustainment
• Darwin Growth Precinct — strategic fuel reserve, Indo-Pacific cooperation
• Canberra Growth Precinct — sovereign data centre estate
• Geelong Growth Precinct — hyperscale data, sovereign drones
• Cairns Growth Precinct — Pacific cable landing, repair vessel
• Perth Growth Precinct — submarine cable hub, Indian Ocean gateway
• Murray Bridge Growth Precinct — cold chain, food processing
• Emerald Growth Precinct — irrigation, processing, beef
• Kununurra Growth Precinct — Kimberley agricultural expansion
• Bell Bay Growth Precinct — green aluminium, ferroalloys
• Mount Isa Growth Precinct — copper, zinc, lead, phosphate
• Latrobe Valley Growth Precinct — grid firming, transmission, ammonia
• Port Kembla Growth Precinct — green steel, offshore wind components
• Geraldton Growth Precinct — rare earths, sovereign fertiliser, Mid West industry
• Portland Growth Precinct — sovereign aluminium, Southern Ocean wind
• Riverina / Sunraysia Growth Network — cold chain, food processing
• Toongabbie Growth Precinct — pharmaceutical sovereignty
• Adelaide Growth Precinct — defence, space & guided weapons (later stage)
• Mulwala–Benalla Growth Precinct — propellants & munitions (later stage)
• Dubbo Growth Precinct — critical-minerals processing (later stage)
• Sydney Growth Precinct — deep tech & undersea autonomy (later stage)
• Sugarbag Growth Precinct — high-purity quartz (later stage)
• Siviour Growth Precinct — graphite anode (later stage)
• Olympic Dam Growth Precinct — copper refining & reserve (later stage)
• Melbourne–Parkville Growth Precinct — biomedical & vaccines (later stage)
• Hobart Growth Precinct — Antarctic gateway (later stage)

The plan, the methodology, and how it's funded

• Costing model — $190.1B over 10 years, five programs
• Year-by-year build plan (draft annual build order)
• Methodology
• Strategic Reserves Architecture
• Citations & sources
• Funding — Green Bonds, super, production revenue
• Policy fit — FMIA, NRF, AUKUS, Critical Minerals
• Seven supply chains — how the precincts connect
• The Engine Room — how Growth Precincts work
• Data Is the New Oil — sovereign compute (WATTLE)
• WATTLE Central — classified core (Canberra)
• WATTLE Compute — sovereign AI training (Tennant Creek)
• WATTLE Labs — physical experimental campus (Henderson)
• WATTLE Field — agricultural intelligence (Emerald)
• Australia's Cable Strategy
• Northern Fuel Pipeline
• Irrigation Modernisation
• What it costs (and what doing nothing costs)
• Cost of living & housing
• Whyalla flagship pilot — start here

Take action

• Find your electorate
• Write to your MP
• Council endorsements
• Business supporters
• All supporters
• The Growing Bulletin
• About Growing Australia

You are seeing this fallback because your browser has JavaScript disabled. The full interactive site requires JavaScript.