Mining Company Plans $73m Workers’ Village in WA

Lithium mining company Albemarle has lodged plans for a $73-million workers’ accommodation project at Binningup in south-west Western Australia with the regional Joint Development Assessment Panel.

The panel will decide on the project’s future on August 15—the meeting agenda indicates that the Shire of Harvey has recommended it refuse approval.

The plans propose using 24.47ha of the site, 154km south of Perth and 31 km north of Bunbury, to provide accommodation and facilities for up to 500 workers for the expansion of the nearby Albemarle Lithium Plant in Kemerton.

The Kemerton plant is 16km south-east of the site.

There will be 128 accommodation villas with both single and double layouts, office, reception and check-in area, commercial kitchen, communal dining hall and function area, recreation centre with a pool, basketball courts, gym and mini golf, and seven laundries.

There will also be -of-house service areas for deliveries and storage and a 350-bay carpark for the workers and a 29-bay carpark with bus and coach bays.

Albemarle said it would invest in a temporary construction camp area with 50 accommodation rooms, kitchen and diner, offices, recreation room, water tanks and a treatment system, and will contribute to the relocation of existing power lines to under the ground.

A solar farm on the site is the subject of a separate development application and is intended to help power the accommodation village.

There are also two protected wetlands in the south-east corner and the western end of the site as well as a tuart eucalyptus woodland ecological community.

The Binningup South Seawater Desalination plant is just north of the site with farming land to the east and south and Binningup town to the west.

▲ A render of the planned facilities for Albemarle’s planned workforce accommodation project in Binningup.

The Shire of Harvey is the responsible local authority for the project, however, the determining authority is the regional Joint Development Assessment Panel.

As the panel cannot make determinations on land use considerations, the application was first sent to the Harvey Shire Council where planning officers recommended that it be advertised for public comment noting that it was an unlisted use being considered. 

Several Binningup residents spoke at the July meeting against the proposal and an initial motion to approve the use and advertise the plans was not seconded.

The council then moved to accept that the plans met conditions for workforce accommodation which do not fit the objectives for a general farming zone under the current planning scheme. 

The Harvey council said in its reasoning for its recommendation that “approval would set an undesirable precedent for like proposals to [be] establish[ed] on General Farming zoned properties across the shire”.

The motion also included sending a recommendation to the joint development assessment panel that the proposal be refused on the grounds of the land use issue. 

Planning officers have recommended that the panel approve the application and allow the proposed plans to be advertised for public comment with a note that the use is not listed in the current planning scheme for the site.

WA earthmoving company B & J Catalano own the 144.5ha site at 96 Binningup Road. The site currently is mostly vacant for grazing plus 28ha set aside for horticulture.

Albemarle plans to lease it for 10 to 15 years and that the accommodation be able to be adapted and re-used after that term is up or that it be returned to vacant pasture.

Element, who is the applicant on behalf of Albemarle, was contacted for comment.