How does the green steel co-investment with BlueScope work?

BlueScope, the operator of the Port Kembla steelworks, is committed to greening its operations but needs scale capital plus green hydrogen supply to make the economics work. The precinct co-invests in green DRI (direct reduced iron) plants using hydrogen from the Pilbara, plus on-site green steelmaking — with BlueScope as the long-term operator under a sovereign lease.

Why offshore wind components here?

The Illawarra is one of Australia's six declared offshore wind zones. Port Kembla has the existing heavy-engineering workforce (including former shipbuilders), deepwater berths and laydown space for monopile, blade and nacelle manufacturing. The precinct builds the components that the Illawarra wind farms will install offshore — keeping the manufacturing value onshore.

What is defence-grade plate?

Specialty steel plate to defence specifications — for hulls, armoured vehicles, weapons systems and AUKUS submarine components. Currently imported. The Port Kembla green-steel build includes a defence-grade plate line, with downstream supply to Henderson (shipbuilding), the Hunter (precision components) and Osborne (submarine build).

Growing Australia

Growing Australia is a fully-costed $190.1B sovereign industry plan to reduce cost-of-living pressure by rebuilding domestic capability in energy, manufacturing, cyber, food and regional partnerships.

The platform contains 48 investments across 26 Growth Precincts, with full costing assumptions and primary-source citations.

Costing model
Citations and sources
Powering Australia
Making It Here
Cyber Australia
Feeding Australia
Our Neighbourhood