Where did $55.4m go? BlueScope's mill upgrade pushes ahead on its own steam

"I know that this project has been in the pipeline for quite a number of years," chief executive of Australian Steel Products Tania Archibald acknowledged at the end of her speech at the Inside Industry Visitor Centre on Friday, June 7.

And it has.

Work on the project had been occurring in-house at BlueScope but in March 2022, the former federal government announced $55.4 million for the Advanced Steel Manufacturing Precinct, which put the project on the national agenda.

Then costed at $217 million, the funding boost would enable the plate mill to be upgraded to produce the steel needed for wind turbines, armoured vehicles and patrol boats.

In collaboration with the University of Wollongong, the precinct would employ 200 people directly, while supporting 1000 workers in adjacent industries.

The federal funding came from the former Coalition government's signature $1.3 billion Modern Manufacturing Initiative, which was rolled out immediately prior to and during the 2022 election campaign.

Upon coming to government, the newly elected Albanese government initiated a review of all projects that were awarded funding and found the projects were awarded on merit.

At the same time, the project was making its way through the NSW planning process.

During the process, a number of changes were made to the project, including removing sections of the project which would have enabled the construction of wind turbine towers, partly due to the low height of bridges over the road network around Port Kembla.

This meant the project no longer fell under the approval conditions of the Modern Manufacturing Initiative and the grant funding was not awarded.

Instead, BlueScope made further changes, including increasing the size of the furnace. These changes, along with industry-wide increases in the cost of construction since 2022, meant the final project would cost $300 million, significantly more than the initial $217 million costing.

"That is the reality with the construction environment today," Ms Archibald said.

Now that the project has been given the green light by the NSW government, the upgraded plate mill, once complete, will supply high-grade steel for construction, mining, infrastructure, transport and defence projects and has the technical capacity to produce 600,000 tonnes of steel a day.

But, Ms Archibald said, the hope to manufacture wind tower components from Illawarra steel remains an a goal for the steelmaker, just perhaps not in Port Kembla.

"We ourselves are not intending to build a wind tower fabrication facility, but we are advocating strongly and very happy to work with partners," she said.

"We want to be the supplier of the high-quality plate that eventually goes into the wind towers."