The Crisafulli government announced today that it’s strengthening Queensland’s fuel security with a $25 million investment, and streamlined approvals, to develop renewable diesel at Ampol’s Lytton refinery.
The funding partnership will support the modification of Ampol’s existing diesel hydrotreater to co-process conventional diesel, with biogenic feedstocks such as waste and plant oils and animal fats, to produce renewable fuel that can be used in any existing diesel engine.
The project, however, is only initially capable of producing up to 20 million litres of renewable diesel a year from 2028, processing 15-20 kilotons of feedstock per year. Experts say Australia burns through 100 million litres of diesel per day.
The partnership – the first to be funded under the state government’s flagship $180.6 million Sovereign Industry Development Fund – is expected to begin production by mid-2027 and will create 46 new jobs, including 40 construction and six operational.
“Fuel security means restoring Queensland’s ability to drill, refine and store – and this project means more fuel produced locally, for Queenslanders,” Premier David Crisafulli said.
“These projects are important to ensure we are never again left at the mercy of foreign nations, at the end of a global supply chain.
“Across the short, medium and long-term we’re getting projects moving to produce oil, refine it and store fuel locally.”
The Lytton refinery announcement comes in the same week the federal government refuted Crisafulli’s claims that red tape was holding up the flow of more oil from Taroom Trough, an outback refinery in the Queensland town of Eromanga.
Environment Minister Murray Watt said on Monday the Queensland Government “can right now approve or streamline the process for an approval of the Taroom project” under existing rules.
He said signing on to new federal environmental laws would further speed up processing but that the lack of a plan from the Sunshine State was the real problem.
“We have still not received a single bit of information from the Queensland government that we could use to fast-track this project if we wanted to,” Senator Watt told ABC radio.
“And that’s why I was prompted to write to David Crisafulli on Friday to say, can you at least give us some basic information? How many wells are we talking about? How deep are they?”
Shell already produces 200 barrels of crude per day in the area but it remains unclear how much oil is in the ground.
“After arriving in a hard hat to announce Labor red tape was blocking the Taroom Trough, it has emerged the Crisafulli government is yet to submit the actual paperwork and was seeking a fast-track pathway that does not exist, to the bewilderment of the Environmental Minister Murray Watt,” wrote Labor MP Shannon Fentiman on her Facebook page.
“Sources say the helmet remains the most advanced part of the proposal.
“Meanwhile, other states are actually governing. NSW activated its emergency fuel crisis coordination centre to manage supply disruptions. Tasmania’s Liberal Government moved to cap fuel price increases to protect motorists. Queensland, by contrast, got another photo op.”
“The Premier also waved away Queensland Labor’s calls for a fuel reserve in Queensland, a cap on excessive price hikes, and greater transparency through public fuel data — practical measures apparently less appealing than another costume change.”