The Mount Isa to Townsville corridor is on the precipice of an economic expansion not seen since the boom of the 1940s, but all hope rests on the delivery of a nation-building project that would revolutionise the mineral and energy-rich region, Katter’s Australian Party Leader Robbie Katter has said.

Mr Katter, buoyed by the news today the $836 million Eva copper project north of Cloncurry had reached a significant milestone on its way to being commissioned in 2024, said the minerals, energy and hydrogen boom set to drive Queensland’s economy over the coming decades could only be unlocked by critical shared infrastructure.

He said the only way to deliver the multitude of projects across minerals, rare earth commodities, power generation and hydrogen was to “normalise” the energy supply across the entire corridor by connecting it to the National Electricity Market .

“The Eva copper mine is just one development amongst the dozens that remain untapped – there is a bonanza of economic opportunity to unwrap across the region including $750 billion of known minerals and rare earth resources,” the Traeger MP said.

“That’s more than ten times the entire annual Queensland Budget, and almost 100 times the predicted value of the of 2032 Brisbane Olympics to the State’s economy.”

Mr Katter said the North West would also be vital to any aspirations of the Palaszczuk Labor Government to “de-carbonise” the economy through the development of a local hydrogen industry.

“The Mount Isa to Townsville corridor is ideally placed to be Queensland’s hydrogen export hub due to its proximity to energy resources, port infrastructure and active hydrogen developers including Korea Zinc, Origin Energy and Edify Energy,” he said.

“We have massive, high-quality energy resources, including the best combined wind and solar resources in the State, all with sufficient scale to support both State and Federal Government hydrogen ambitions.

“The quality of these resources is backed up by research from the CSIRO and Geoscience Australia who identify the Mount Isa to Townsville corridor as one of the most highly prospective areas for hydrogen production in the country.”

Mr Katter said the NWMP also had existing gas-fired generation that would be required to firm-up renewables and provide much needed support to the east coast grid.

“To realise these opportunities we need the shared infrastructure that will enable the development of multiple projects across minerals, renewable energy and hydrogen.

“I know the Premier and Energy Minister, Mick de Brenni, have been working with CopperString and have been very supportive, as has the Prime Minister and Commonwealth Government.

“If the Premier and Minister de Brenni can make-good on the ambitions they have outlined for the the Mount Isa to Townsville corridor and deliver CopperString and the mining and energy investment it will support, we’ll feel like all our Christmas’ have come at once – and they’ll be more popular than Santa Clause.”

Federal Member for Kennedy Bob Katter said building CopperString 2.0 had never been more critical.

“I think it’s reasonable to say that Eva will double copper production into Mount Isa’s copper smelter, guaranteeing the life of the copper smelter and guaranteeing the life of Ernst Henry Mine, critical to Cloncurry,” he said.

“Both are now underpinned by EVA and that is a very good thing, but you’ve got to make the figures stack up.

“There are huge disadvantages at the present, because their competitor’s product is carried by negligible government-owned transportation system with negligible charges.

“But if the CopperString transmission line gets through, they can buy the cheapest available electricity in Australia.”