DEAR News Of The Area,
IN his recent letter (Tomago Aluminium bailout is a crisis of Government policy, NOTA, 27/8/26), Troy Radford describes the Tomago Aluminium agreement as a bailout caused by government energy policy. He’s right about one thing: Tomago is enormously important to the Hunter.
But blaming renewable energy for Tomago’s challenges ignores what the company and its majority owner Rio Tinto are actually doing.
Tomago needs cheaper, reliable electricity to remain internationally competitive, and Rio Tinto is investing heavily in renewable energy to secure the future of its Australian aluminium operations.
At Tomago, the new agreement provides a pathway to 100 per cent renewable electricity from 2033, while in Queensland Rio has already contracted 2.8GW of renewable energy to help repower its Gladstone operations.
These are commercial investment decisions aimed at keeping Australian aluminium internationally competitive.
Troy also overlooks a fundamental fact: NSW’s coal-fired power stations are privately owned.
Governments don’t decide how long Origin operates Eraring or AGL operates Bayswater. The companies that own and operate these power stations are making those decisions.
They are retiring ageing coal assets and investing in renewables, storage and firming because that is where they see the future of the energy market.
And the Tomago agreement isn’t simply taxpayers picking up the tab. It secures 1000 direct jobs and another 5000 across the Hunter, requires Tomago to invest at least $1.1 billion in the smelter, and underpins nearly 3GW of new renewable generation and firming.
Importantly, the agreement also provides for revenue to flow back to the Federal Government when aluminium prices are high.
The real question for taxpayers is: what would it have cost the Hunter and Australia not to support Tomago?
Losing the smelter would mean losing thousands of jobs, around $800 million in annual local spending, $2.2 billion in annual economic activity, and a strategically important Australian manufacturing capability.
That’s not simply a subsidy. It’s an investment in keeping jobs, industry and manufacturing capability in Australia.
The energy transition certainly has challenges, and governments must get reliability, affordability and infrastructure right.
But the Hunter’s choice isn’t between renewable energy and manufacturing.
The challenge is using the energy transition to keep industries like Tomago, and their jobs, here in the Hunter.
Justin Page,
Coordinator,
Hunter Jobs Alliance.
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