Illustrative image: critical-minerals processing infrastructure in Queensland.
Queensland Parliament has passed legislation giving the state government expanded powers to accelerate major projects, including critical-minerals mines, processing facilities and associated infrastructure.
The State Development and Public Works Organisation (Critical Minerals) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2026 passed on Wednesday night, according to the Queensland Government and ABC News. The government says the legislation will help Queensland compete for investment in critical-minerals supply chains. Farmers, conservation groups and legal commentators have raised concerns about compulsory acquisition, reduced appeal rights and the breadth of ministerial powers, ABC reported.
The bill amends the State Development and Public Works Organisation Act 1971 and related legislation. Its provisions cover projects from mineral extraction through processing, infrastructure and export, according to the department’s written briefing to the Primary Industries and Resources Committee.
What changed under the legislation
The central change is the creation of a new State Strategic Project category.
Under the bill, the minister may declare a prescribed project to be state strategic if it is considered critical or essential to Queensland for economic, environmental or social reasons, or if it is a high priority likely to contribute significantly to the government’s objectives for the state or a region. The relevant provisions are set out in the Queensland bill text.
The category replaces the previous “critical infrastructure project” designation and provides access to a broader set of facilitation tools. The government’s written briefing says the most substantial powers are intended for projects of the highest significance and priority.
The framework is not limited to a particular commodity. Queensland’s government has identified vanadium, cobalt and copper among the state’s critical-minerals resources, while the legislation also covers other state-owned minerals and energy resources. The department said Queensland has significant deposits of copper, graphite, silicon, permanent-magnet minerals and vanadium, but that development outside copper has been constrained by remoteness, infrastructure costs, regulatory complexity and competition for capital.
The new designation can therefore apply to a mine, refinery, mineral separation plant, transport connection or other project that meets the statutory test. It also allows a project to be declared state strategic after it has already been declared a prescribed project.
Illustrative image: open-pit mining and processing infrastructure in regional Queensland.
Faster coordination for mines and processing facilities
The bill rewrites the infrastructure provisions of the 1971 Act. The former prescribed-development framework is replaced by infrastructure coordination plans.
According to the department, the new system is designed to coordinate infrastructure for one or more resources projects. That could include power, water, roads, rail, housing and other services needed to support development in a new resources region.
The legislation allows the minister to direct the Coordinator-General to investigate infrastructure needs associated with one project or several projects. The bill’s explanatory framework gives the example of a graphite mine in western Queensland linked to a processing facility in Townsville, with rail infrastructure required to connect the two.
That basin-scale approach is significant for critical minerals projects because the commercial case may depend on infrastructure that no single developer can build economically. A processing plant may need feedstock from several mines, while multiple projects may share transport, energy or water infrastructure.
The Coordinator-General must prepare an investigation report covering the projects, their infrastructure requirements and possible ways to meet those needs. Affected parties, including proponents, local governments and infrastructure operators, must be given an opportunity to make submissions.
If the minister decides that a coordination plan should proceed, the plan must identify the relevant projects, infrastructure, land, parties and responsibilities. The plan is approved by regulation and is intended to provide a formal structure for coordinating project delivery.
For miners, the potential benefit is clearer sequencing between mine development, processing capacity and infrastructure construction. It may also reduce the risk that a project advances through one approval process while a related road, railway, power connection or water facility remains unresolved.
The legislation also creates a pathway for certain planning applications to be referred to the Coordinator-General while an infrastructure investigation is underway or an infrastructure coordination plan is in effect. The minister may return the application to the ordinary decision-maker, maintain a temporary suspension or, in specified circumstances, decide the application directly.
Land access and compulsory acquisition
The legislation also changes how land access can be secured for projects considered strategically important.
A state strategic project proponent may apply for an access authority to investigate land where negotiations with an owner have failed. The authority may permit surveys, sampling, geotechnical investigations, temporary access tracks and related activities, subject to notice, conditions and compensation requirements.
The bill also permits access authorities for limited, temporary enabling works associated with a state strategic project. Those works require approval by the Governor in Council and must be necessary to enable the project while not unreasonably interfering with the landowner’s use of the land.
Before entering land, the holder of an access authority generally must provide written notice and a copy of the authority. The legislation provides for rectification of damage, compensation and, where required, a bond or security deposit.
A separate pathway allows land to be compulsorily acquired for a state strategic project. The Coordinator-General may take land only after the project has been endorsed for that purpose and the land has been identified in a regulation.
The bill requires the Coordinator-General to be satisfied that the proponent has the financial and technical capability to undertake the project in a timely way. It also requires the proponent to have negotiated with each registered owner for at least six months and taken reasonable steps to purchase the land by agreement. Where native title exists, the proponent must have taken reasonable steps to enter into an Indigenous land use agreement.
Before compulsory acquisition can proceed, the proponent must make a final unconditional offer. The land acquisition process then operates through the existing Queensland acquisition framework, including compensation provisions, according to the department’s briefing.
Illustrative image: mineral-processing equipment and plant controls.
Modification orders and appeal rights
The bill creates two further mechanisms for state strategic projects: State significance notices and modification orders.
A State significance notice requires a decision-maker to consider the purposes of the state strategic project framework and any matters specified by the minister. The notice does not automatically dictate the final decision, but it gives the minister a formal role in the decision-making process.
A modification order allows a regulation to exclude or modify the application of specified provisions of another Act to a state strategic project. The government says the mechanism is intended to address duplication or regulatory gaps, including situations involving unfamiliar processing technology.
The power is subject to conditions. The bill requires consultation with the project proponent, the responsible minister for each affected Act and local bodies considered likely to be affected. It also provides that modification orders must not remove key authorisations, including environmental authorities, resource authorities, development approvals, cultural heritage management plans or required land rights.
However, the legislation can narrow review and appeal rights. The bill provides that some decisions approving a state strategic project, or an aspect of one, cannot be reviewed or appealed under the relevant legislation. Judicial review is preserved in specified circumstances, and decisions made by the minister under the infrastructure coordination framework must be accompanied by reasons and reported to Parliament.
That balance is at the centre of the political dispute. The Queensland Government says the legislation preserves core environmental, planning, resources and cultural heritage approvals. The Environmental Defenders Office Queensland told ABC that the amendments did not add what it considered meaningful safeguards or sufficient transparency around the new powers.
Late amendments protect some land uses
Two amendments made before passage are particularly relevant to miners and competing land users.
The final legislation excludes renewable energy projects, including solar, wind and battery projects, and data centres from eligibility for State Strategic Project status, according to the Queensland Government and ABC.
The amendments also retain the requirement for a Regional Interests Development Approval, or RIDA, where one is required. The RIDA framework applies to areas of regional interest, including strategic cropping land and prime agricultural land.
The government said the change protects important agricultural areas while allowing critical-minerals projects to proceed through a coordinated framework. Queensland Farmers’ Federation Chief Executive Kylie Porter welcomed the passage of the amended legislation, while noting that project proponents would still need to act appropriately in agricultural communities.
The amendments do not remove the need for miners to address landholder, agricultural, environmental or cultural heritage issues. Instead, they preserve RIDA as a separate protected instrument while integrating parts of its assessment with the broader coordinated-project process.
Implications for miners
For mining companies, the legislation changes the development environment in four main ways:
| Policy area | Likely effect for project proponents |
|---|---|
| State Strategic Project status | Provides a high-priority designation and access to additional coordination powers |
| Infrastructure coordination | Allows planning across multiple projects and shared mine-to-processing infrastructure |
| Land access | Creates new tools for investigations, temporary enabling works and, in limited cases, compulsory acquisition |
| Approvals and reviews | May reduce duplication and shorten some processes, while limiting certain third-party appeal rights |
The immediate commercial benefit is greater government coordination around projects that require several approvals and shared infrastructure. That could improve schedule visibility for mines, refineries and mineral-processing hubs, particularly in remote regions.
The legislation does not guarantee a project approval. The Queensland Government has explicitly said that State Strategic Project status will not automatically approve development or remove existing environmental, planning or resources approvals.
For investors, the new framework may provide a stronger signal of state support for large critical-minerals projects. It may also reduce some tenure and infrastructure risks during project development.
At the same time, investors will need to assess the social and political risks created by the legislation. Compulsory acquisition powers and reduced appeal rights may lower some execution barriers for proponents but increase community opposition, reputational exposure and scrutiny from environmental and agricultural groups.
The first test will be how Queensland uses the new powers. Industry groups are waiting to see which project is designated first and whether the framework delivers faster approvals without creating additional conflict around land, water, agriculture and environmental protection.
For broader context, Skillings’ coverage of critical-minerals and rare earths developments tracks how regulatory changes are reshaping supply chains, while its copper market analysis examines the demand pressures supporting new mine and processing investment.
Sources
- Queensland Government: New laws supercharge Queensland’s critical minerals future
- ABC News: Amendments relieve farmers and concern environmental groups as bill becomes law
- Queensland legislation: State Development and Public Works Organisation (Critical Minerals) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2026
- Queensland parliamentary committee written briefing
