CopperString 2.0 critical for North Queensland's green hydrogen potential says CuString chairman John O'Brien

"The CopperString corridor between Townsville and Mount Isa has the best wind and solar resources in Queensland to fuel the development of a 'green' hydrogen industry, and unlike other regions North Queensland has an abundance of water, all the key ingredients for our State's continuing decarbonisation through hydrogen," said CuString Executive Chairman Mr John O'Brien ahead of the Queensland Government's Hydrogen Working Group meeting in Townsville this week.

Mr O'Brien said that the company's project would link Australia's best solar and wind resources with hydrogen production facilities in Townsville to create a world-leading hydrogen export hub.

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"There's also the Port of Townsville expansion and the Lansdown Eco-Industrial Precinct in the works which will be Northern Australia's first environmentally sustainable advanced manufacturing, technology and processing hub so the opportunity for our region is enormous if we invest in backbone infrastructure such as CopperString."

Mr O'Brien said the development of a northern Queensland hydrogen industry had accelerated more quickly than anticipated with global industrial businesses such as Korea Zinc and their subsidiaries Ark Energy and Sun Metals, Origin Energy and Kawasaki Heavy Industries mapping out clear development plans for hydrogen export.

"Part of the billions of dollars in investment that hydrogen can bring to North Queensland over the next 10 years will be increasing the electricity supply to Townsville by four, five or six times, and access to the enormous high-quality renewable resources unlocked by CopperString will be critical," he said.

Mr O'Brien referred to a recent Geoscience Australia report that showed that CopperString cut through the heartland of massive highly reliable renewable resources.

"The area around Hughenden has a potential renewable energy capacity factor of 58 percent while other prospective areas proximal to our infrastructure include Kidston (capacity factor up to 52 percent) and around Mount Isa (capacity factor up to 56 percent), so North Queensland can compete with any region in the world on hydrogen" Mr O'Brien said.

"In simple terms, the wind around Hughenden blows primarily overnight and the sun shines in the west after we lose solar generation on the east coast and the ability to leverage off the CopperString development to bring these immense resources online very quickly is a huge advantage for Townsville."

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