Economically speaking, why bother producing the steel in Australia? The vast majority of it is mined nowhere near the normal population centres, so there’s not

Economically speaking, why bother producing the steel in Australia? The vast majority of it is mined nowhere near the normal population centres, so there’s not really any convenience in refining it on site. By the time you’ve gotten it to a port, you aren’t going to be losing that much transporting the ore rather than steel. I think you also need coal, which iirc is by and large not located close to the iron ore resources. Additionally, I’d bet the value-add (profitwise) from steel refining is not very high - it would be a competitive industry, since anyone can spin up a refinery and import the steel. The restriction is the iron supply, so that’s where the price impact hits if there’s a shortage. It’s all a matter of economics, and it appears that it’s not very profitable to produce steel in Australia - so we don’t.