The London-headquartered mining company Rio Tinto will invest US$1.9bn to develop the Kangwinan bauxite project on Western Cape York Peninsula in Queensland, Australia.
The miner states that this brownfield investment will leverage Rio Tinto’s project execution capability and reflects continued application of the company’s disciplined capital allocation framework. It will add 20 million tons of annual bauxite production capacity in Weipa, leveraging some existing infrastructure, with first output targeted in 2029 and full production expected by 2032.
The project will replace production from the Andoom mine near Weipa as it reaches the end of its life this decade, while increasing Weipa Operations’ annual capacity to about 44 million tons, from current production of around 38 million tons per year. It will also help compensate for the planned end of production at the Gove mine in the Northern Territory in 2029.
Kangwinan, where early works began in 2025, will establish a new bauxite production center 15 kilometers south-east of Rio Tinto’s Amrun mine, which is located 40km south of the town of Weipa. A 15-kilometre conveyor will transport ore from Kangwinan to expanded stockyard facilities and the existing Amrun wharf.
The Amrun wharf will be expanded to accommodate larger capesize vessels, improving supply-chain efficiency and reducing freight costs, according to Rio Tinto.
Construction will ramp up in 2027 and is expected to support more than 1,300 construction jobs. Longer term, the project will help sustain Rio Tinto’s residentially based workforce of around 1,500 people in the Western Cape.
