Blasting off from an ancient land

What happens to a remote First Nations community when the only local mine stops operating after a number of decades? In northeast Arnhem Land, the local community, the Gumatj corporation and Rio Tinto are planning for that very scenario when bauxite mining stops in the region in 2030. Already replacement industries ranging from rocket launch facility expansion to solar farming, housing construction, a green energy project and roadworks are taking shape. But the future beyond large-scale mining is still unclear.

Nhulunbuy, East Arnhem Land. It’s where the red dirt and songlines of an ancient land connect with space-age technology and a modern future. It’s also home to the entrepreneurial Gumatj Corporation, which may be a small entity, but one which has big plans for the future that include expanding the current rocket launch base, according to CEO Klaus Helms.

“I guess what I'm saying is we are small,” Helms said during a speech to the Garma Festival this year. “We're not a big company, but we take risks and say, let's try it. Let's do this because no one else out there is going to build this company up or build this region up as a single entity.”

As traditional owners of the isolated zone where the launch sites are located, the Gumatj clan hopes to secure jobs for local Yolnu people through the space initiative.

The Gumatj Corporation has agreed to a 24-year lease over a stretch of Gumatj land to allow the Arnhem Space Centre to expand. The centre is owned and operated by Equatorial Launch Australia, which launched three NASA suborbital rockets in mid-2022 and has scheduled launches in mid-2025 with South Korean rocket company Innospace.

Equatorial Launch Australia has lodged plans for the expansion with the NT Environment Protection Authority to 300 hectares and 14 launch pads.

Helms said the rocket launch pad concept started with 64 hectares of land. “We're now at 280 hectares of leased land.” The expansion would be “colossal for this region - not just this region - for the Northern Territory. And I really welcome that”, he said.

End of an era

The space industry innovation comes at a time when large-scale bauxite mining at nearby Gove is being phased out by the year 2030 by Rio Tinto and local communities are exploring new business opportunities.

In 2019, the Gove Peninsula Futures Reference Group was created to support the survival of Nhunulunbuy and Gove Peninsula post-mining. The Gumatj Corporation, Rirratjingu Aboriginal Corporation, the Northern Land Council, Rio Tinto, the Northern Territory Government and the Commonwealth Government created the entity.

Six key industries identified by the Gumatj corporation for development are port logistics, manufacturing, agriculture, mining, aerospace, and tourism and arts.

First Nations-owned businesses in the area already include a regional training centre, a batch plant, sawmill and workshop, cattle operations, grounds maintenance, mechanical workshops, waste management, a construction company, survey company, community store, cafe, nursery and real estate property investment.

Gumatj, a 100 per cent owned First nations enterprise set up in 2007, which is chaired by clan leader Djawa Yunupingu, is working with Rio Tinto on the mining phaseout and on new subsidiary industries. Royalties paid to the Gumatj clan will cease when Rio Tinto closes the mine, which has operated for more than 50 years.

Gove bauxite is shipped internationally as well as domestically to supply Queensland Alumina Limited and Yarwun refineries in Gladstone, Queensland. These refineries produce alumina as feedstock for Australian aluminium smelting operations and for sale on the international market.

Besides the rocket launch expansion, the Gumatj corporation is also working on solar power ventures, house construction and agricultural crops, the transition of a cattle station into a tourism centre, consulting firms, land services and commercial businesses, according to Helms. Twenty-three houses have been constructed using local sand crushed from rocks, using new equipment bought by the corporation. Gumatj has also signed an MOU with Allied Green Ammonia to build a green hydrogen manufacturing hub on the Gove Peninsula.

The future

While the future may be unwritten for the Gumatj clan and other local clans of north-east Arnhem Land who are seeking and planning a future beyond mining, one thing is sure.

“There are some mines around Australia that really have become ghost towns,” Helms said. “Our job is to make sure that doesn't happen.”

Two new 5.25MW solar farms will be built on Gumatj and Rirratjingu country on the Gove Peninsula, as Rio Tinto works to help secure a more sustainable power supply for the local region beyond mining.

The solar farms will be built on Rio Tinto leases, following agreement with the Gumatj and Rirratjingu Traditional Owner Groups and will help to underpin a low-carbon future for the Gove community. Rio Tinto has mined bauxite in the area since 2007.

Aggreko will construct, own and operate the solar farms for Rio Tinto for up to 10 years. Construction began in July 2024, with completion scheduled for early 2025. The two sites will have combined capacity of 10.5MW.

Rio Tinto Gove Operations Acting General Manager Shannon Price said the solar farms are expected to reduce annual CO₂ emissions at its Gove operations by up to 17 per cent and reduce the region’s annual diesel consumption by about 20 per cent.

Rio Tinto CEO Kellie Parker told the Garma Festival that the traditional owners are helping the mining giant to prepare to leave the site. “Rio Tinto is very aware of the responsibility we hold to leave Gove in a better place than when mining first started.”

The phaseout is to be the largest demolition project in Australia's history. “We have already begun shipping the equivalent of three Sydney Harbour bridges, or 21 office towers in scrap steel for recycling and together with Gumatj, we're creating employment and economic opportunities for local people.”

Gumatj is supplying Rio with equipment for demolition and is playing a key role in deciding what is kept and what is removed in order to rehabilitate the refinery and mine site.

An expanded mining operation is in the development mix. Gulkula Mine is Australia’s first First Nations-owned and operated bauxite mine. It’s operated by Gulkula Mining Company, a subsidiary of the Gumatj Corporation.

The mine sits on the Dhupuma Plateau, located 1,000 kilometres east of Darwin and 40km from the nearest town of Nhulunbuy. It runs as a satellite mine - feeding bauxite, the source of aluminium, into the massive nearby Rio Tinto mining operation a 30-minute drive down the coast.

The first shipment of bauxite from Gulkula Mine was sent to China in 2018. At the Garma Festival this year, Parker announced the signing of an MOU partnership with Gulkula Mining to start contract mining within Rio’s bauxite mining lease.

“Gulkula will have transferable skills and equipment that can be utilised on our bauxite mine site. This creates a natural progression for Gumatj to determine its future use,” said Parker.