‘Superpower’: We’ve got the minerals and we’re here to help, Rudd tells US

Washington: Australia is uniquely positioned to help the Trump administration diversify its critical minerals supply chains, ambassador Kevin Rudd says, and is putting “cash on the table” that should be considered amid pressure over defence spending.

Speaking at an event in Washington, the former prime minister said discussions were under way about how to deliver pricing certainty on the global market for those minerals and rare earths – including a potential price floor, as Resources Minister Madeleine King has also confirmed.

“We are confident that if we get these policy settings right, Australia will be – in critical minerals and rare earths – a great power, if not a superpower in the world,” Rudd said.

“That’s how nature has endowed us, it’s what we’re good at, and contrary to the views of some, it is a massively high-technology business.”

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has flagged Australia will establish a strategic reserve of critical minerals, of which the country has 36 of the 50 identified by the US. One of the Trump administration’s priorities is to diversify its supply chain to break China’s stranglehold on processed minerals.

Critical minerals are usually defined as any non-fuel substance or element necessary for energy, technology and manufacturing, including aluminium, cobalt, magnesium, nickel, tungsten, zinc and many others.

King told an industry forum in Perth on Tuesday night that Australia ought to take “global responsibility” for processing and supplying rare earths, not just digging them out of the ground.

Backing up that view, Rudd cast Australia as a reliable alternative to China for the US and other customers.

“As a US ally, we are ready and able to help, and we have the capacity to do so,” he told the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, a bipartisan think tank, on Wednesday (Thursday AEST).

Rudd highlighted significant government expenditure on mining and processing of critical minerals, including $17 billion worth of tax incentives for companies, the $3.4 billion Geoscience Australia initiative to locate and develop rare earths, and a $1.65 billion loan to Iluka Resources to build a lithium processing facility in Western Australia.

There was also significant funding through the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility to aid development of new projects in Australia’s high north (WA, the Northern Territory and north Queensland), Rudd said.

“Are [we] putting cash on the table? Yes,” he said. Asked whether, in the context of US pressure for Australia to spend significantly more on defence, critical minerals should be considered defence goods, Rudd said yes.

“The facts speak for themselves,” he said, pointing to the nuclear-powered Virginia-class submarine, of which Australia would purchase three to five under AUKUS. Each boat contained about 4.5 tonnes of highly processed critical minerals and rare earths, Rudd said.

The comments came a day after US President Donald Trump met the chief executives of Australian mining companies BHP and Rio Tinto in the Oval Office. The firms are vying to develop America’s largest untapped copper deposit in Arizona under a joint venture known as Resolution Copper.

That project was dealt a blow, however, as a US court granted a temporary injunction against a parcel of land being transferred for the mine, due to opposition from a local Native American tribe. Trump lashed out at the “radical left court”, branding it un-American.

Rudd noted there were another 20 to 25 key mining projects in the US involving Australian companies. “The president recognises the size of these companies, their ability to act,” he said.

Australia has been in discussions with the Trump administration about critical minerals in the context of negotiations over US tariffs, and remains hopeful of securing a deal to reduce some of Trump’s levies.

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