The eye-watering job costs of keeping Tomago smelter open

August 13, 2026 — 4:41pm

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Australian taxpayers will pay $2.5 billion to Tomago Aluminium, majority-owned by Rio Tinto, to keep its Hunter Valley smelter open after 2028. But who knows for how long?

Amid falling commodity prices, rising power prices and the impact of the high Australian dollar, Rio Tinto has been playing bluff poker with Australian governments for more than a decade, even warning last year that surging power costs would close Tomago when its energy supply contract ran out in 2028.

The smelter is the single largest user of electricity in NSW. It consumes more than 10 per cent of the state’s power supply.

The federal and NSW governments have agreed to split the Tomago bailout........

© The Sydney Morning Herald