ONE broker, attempting to sum up the challenge facing Kingstream Steel’s Oakajee project, suggested: “it’s a bit like a shipyard with the resources to build fishing boats attempting to launch the QEII”.
THE Western Australian nickel industry is waiting for a rationalisation of the besieged laterite projects, particularly the fate of the Cawse mine, owned by Joseph Gutnick’s Centaur Mining.
Heron also has extended its community involvement to Aboriginal education, establishing a bursary to send a school leaver to university or to allow younger students to attend school in Kalgoorlie.
A RELATIONSHIP with a computer can be as intimate as that with a car – familiarity leads to a situation in which chocolate wrappers, hair pins, old credit card dockets disappear into the keyboard, as they do into the glove box.
ROCKS and bugs could play a major role in checking Australia’s biggest environmental problem, soil salinity, as well as clearing the State’s waterways of choking weed and other pollutants.
AUSTRALIA compares favourably with most other oil producers in the level of taxation that applies to oil and gas production, although there are concerns about changes proposed to depreciation rates.
THE Lalor brothers, Peter and Chris, abandoned the legal profession to become two of Australia’s most successful miners, surpassing even their own high expectations.
THE Western Australian oil and gas industry, now in an unprecedented period of growth, faces one problem for which no solution is in sight – Greenhouse emissions.
WA’S almost embarrassingly plentiful natural gas reserves will be put to use in producing a commonplace fuel, if a current study by two oil industry giants produces positive results.
PERTH-BASED Basin Minerals is expected to launch the world’s next major mineral sands project in Victoria, as sources diminish for the key mineral zircon.
THE hire car industry has been targeted by the WA Ministry of Fair Trading, which has joined similar bodies around the country in a bid to end unfair practices.
WHILE the talk of the increased export potential of WA’s gas has the sector preparing for another development boom, the State’s domestic natural gas market has suffered setback delays in two major resource projects.
WA will depend even more on a weak Australian dollar to preserve its prosperity in the next year, as commodity prices continue to come under pressure, with nickel a prime example.
LIKE farmers watching the skies for signs of rain, companies worth billions of dollars are scanning the economic horizon, trying to determine whether it will be a good season for iron ore.
THE offshore oil and gas fields of Western Australia have the potential to be of global import-ance, rivalling the Gulf of Mexico, according to Jim Bass, managing director of Apache Energy.
KIMBERLEY Diamond Co NL has discovered encouraging – and sur-prising – concentrations of gems at shallow depth in the Ellendale pipes it is acquiring from the Rio Tinto subsidiary Argyle Diamonds.
Two of the world’s leading technology companies have joined small local firms to market major products developed here, confirming the way in which the State’s resource industries generate expertise.
A congenial evening at Kalgoorlie’s historic Hannan’s Club, venue for mining deals for a century, led to a dramatic change of direction for WMC in its attitude towards the emerg-ing lateritic nickel industry.
Ellendale, a diamond field discovered a quarter of a century ago, is finally to be mined following its sale by the Rio Tinto company Argyle Diamonds to Kimberley Diamond Co.
SYDNEY architects Kann Finch has provided Business News with an indication of what Perth can look forward to when the new $250 million Woodside building is completed in August 2003.
US giant Hallibuton Energy Services has agreed to be a dealer of a new hydraulic percussion hammer manufactured by SDS Corp at its Canning Vale premises.
Exodus Minerals is the latest mining company to venture into the technology sector, announcing the appointment of biopharmacuetical executive Roger Aston to its board.
GLOBAL shortages of the hi-tech metal tantalum has forced a European consumer to air freight concentrates from Perth, despite the fact that two thirds of it will be discarded in processing.
NEW sulphide nickel mines and the likely expansion of others this year will challenge the claim that lateritic deposits will dominate the market in the next few years.
THE thrust and parry of the attempt by Shell to acquire Woodside Petroleum has prompted some analysts to believe the Australian company is seeking to produce “a press release a day”, to dissuade its shareholders from defecting.
IMPROVING commodity prices gave WA resource industries a more rewarding 12 months in 2000, and there is the prospect that the recovery in its fortunes will continue in the first year of the new century.
