A traditionally "spiky" commodity could be Tasmania's ticket into a booming industry, according to the general manager of the state's first and only nickel mine.
The Avebury Nickel Mine, about 10 kilometres from Zeehan on Tasmania's West Coast, reopened and began producing in September after sitting in care and maintenance for 13 years.
General manager John Lamb said a crash in nickel prices in the late 2000s killed the mine nine months after it opened, and it had sat unused ever since.
Earlier this year it was announced the mine had been bought by Mallee Resources on the back of yet another spike in nickel prices.
"Now is the time for nickel," Mr Lamb said.
"Prices used to bounce around the US$12,000–$15,000 a tonne mark. Now I think you'll see US$20,000–23,000 a tonne mark.
"The shift is because of the demand from [electric vehicle] manufacturers."
That is because one of the main materials in an EV battery is nickel.
Various market researchers have estimated EVs will make up between a third and two-thirds of global sales by 2030.
Whatever the true number, Mr Lamb believed the mine would be part of it, and estimated the mine could ship around 40,000 tonnes a year out of the Port of Burnie.
"On the global scale it's a fairly tiny percentage, I suppose," he said.
"But it's very important for Tasmania because we produce the right sort of nickel — battery grade."
Mr Lamb said he firmly believed careful management of resources would put the mine in a good position to ride the ups and downs of the market, but admitted the operation was far from being in the black.
Cautious optimism in town
Meanwhile, the mine's restart has brought a fresh wave of hope to the West Coast community — alongside a healthy dose of caution for lifelong Zeehan resident Dale Culson.
Mr Culson was one of a small handful of workers who stayed on at the mine after it closed in 2009, keeping it in working order until a new owner was found.
He remembered mining companies poking around the site over the years, some of them "tyre-kickers", others showing a little more promise, such as previous owner Dundas Mining.
The company bought the mine in 2017 for $25 million, promising much of what Mallee Resources is in the process of carrying out — 200 jobs, local employment, 50,000 tonnes a year in production.
However, the restart never came. The company later ran into financial troubles, went into receivership in 2021, and the mine was snapped up by its current owner.
And, according to Mr Culson, the town had been "buzzing" ever since.
"It's great to see it happening again; we've been waiting for it a while," he said.
"It was pretty quiet for a while, this little town … It's pretty hard to get a property here at the moment because people have gobbled them up. There's a lot of new faces … it's definitely improved."
Adrian "Pipi" Williams is one of more than 100 new employees to join the team since July.
A lifelong Zeehan resident until recently, Mr Williams moved more than two hours' drive away just before taking the job.
But he doesn't mind the commute, regularly driving down to directly oversee the team of underground workers.
Commuters like Mr Williams also ease pressure on the small town, which has struggled to cope with the new influx of people.
'A modern critical minerals mine'
When asked about restarting a mine among growing opposition from environmental groups, Mr Lamb was quick to point out an apparent lack of communication between industry and its naysayers.
"The debate needs to be genuinely joined from both sides," he said.
"Opposing green groups need to realise … modern society can't exist without mining and minerals.
"Miners need to recognise that there are other values … social, cultural, natural … and sometimes they outweigh the values of the minerals we're producing.
"What we're aiming to do with Avebury is give Australia an example of what a modern critical minerals mine should look like — it's neat and it's clean and it's small.
"We work really hard to keep the footprint tiny.
"We're putting the waste that we make back down underground as fill in the stopes, and we're powering it with hydro-electric power."
Mr Lamb said the company was hoping to switch over to electric vehicles but, with the first shipment of product still sitting at the Port of Burnie until it built up enough for export, that could be a way off.
