The Western Australian government announced on February 4 that a new major deepwater iron ore port will be built for the Pilbara region. The port is going to be located in Anketell which is in 30 km east of Karratha and 10 km from Cape Lambert.
The port and industrial zone will complement the Port Hedland and Dampier ports. The facility, which will have an annual capacity of 350 million mt, will be built by a private proponent under an agreement with the state government.
Three significant iron ore projects are potential foundation investors in the area: API Management for its 30-40 million mt per year West Pilbara iron ore project, Fortescue Metals Group Ltd for its 30-60 million mt per year Solomon project and China Metallurgical Group Corporation for its 15 million mt per year Cape Lambert iron ore project.
"The government will work with these companies or with an infrastructure provider to develop the project, with plans to commence operations by 2015," Western Australian Premier Colin Barnett said.
In 2008-09 the Pilbara exported more than 326 million mt of bulk commodities, mainly iron ore, and it is expected to reach more than 530 million mt per year by 2015 and as much as 750 million mt per year by 2020.