King said the “next big story” was the expansion of critical minerals exports when India needed rare earths to support renewable power.
“Critical minerals and rare earths are part of the puzzle that everyone will need to decarbonise the economy and every country has its plans around that and they’re all different and they have to be different because we all have different starting spots,” she said.
While Japanese companies have invested in Australian rare earth miner Lynas and Chinese companies have several lithium investments in Australia, there has been no equivalent Indian investment in the sector to date.
The stronger security relationship with India – a member of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue alongside Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States – is expected to be a factor in the talks on energy security and the supply of rare earths this week.
The Chinese foreign ministry criticised Australia last week over decisions that have restricted investment from China in rare earths miners, such as a move to stop a Chinese fund increasing its stake in Northern Minerals.
“We hope that Australia can provide a fair and non-discriminatory environment for Chinese enterprises to operate in Australia,” ministry spokesman Mao Ning said on Friday at a press briefing, Bloomberg reported.
King said India would also need gas from Australia and this highlighted the case for Woodside Petroleum’s Scarborough gas field development off the coast of Western Australia. She added that lithium hydroxide plants needed gas to refine the mineral.
While the Scarborough project is strongly opposed by environmental groups, King said she believed it would go ahead and needed to go ahead because Western Australia – her home state – needed the gas.
“If you don’t have the Scarborough gas plant, then you’re shutting off Western Australia’s economy and that would be unacceptable to the economy of the whole nation,” she said.