Greenvale Energy

Drilling core for process development test work

Alpha Torbanite Project

 - Level 1, 1 Alvan St, Subiaco, WA, 6008      

 - Ground Floor, 41-47 Colin St, West Perth, WA, 6005

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The current project tenure has been held by Alpha Resources Pty Ltd, a subsidiary of Greenvale Energy Limited, since 2002. Greenvale has progressively advanced the project from a resource and geological opportunity into a product-development and process-technology opportunity.

The project’s recent technical evolution has focused on determining whether Alpha material can be converted into a marketable bituminous product suitable for Australian infrastructure applications. 

Earlier test programs investigated the use of Alpha torbanite and cannelite feedstocks to generate bitumen-like products, with subsequent programs becoming increasingly targeted toward C-170 bitumen. This progression has included catalyst and solvent screening, pressure liquefaction test work, product recovery, viscosity improvement, volatile removal and downstream product modification.

The strategic value of Alpha has become increasingly apparent as Australia’s exposure to crude-oil refining/imported bitumen has moved from an abstract supply-chain issue to a direct infrastructure risk.

Bitumen is a fundamental input into road construction and maintenance. It is used in asphalt, spray seal, emulsions, polymer modified binders, cutback bitumen and related products. These materials underpin the construction, maintenance and safety of Australia’s road networks. Any sustained disruption to bitumen supply has the potential to affect road authorities, contractors, maintenance schedules, regional transport networks and critical infrastructure delivery.

Australia imports the majority of its bitumen, with supply historically sourced from Asian refineries in countries such as South Korea, Singapore and China. Those refineries are themselves exposed to imported crude oil feedstocks, including crude sourced from the Middle East. Recent conflict and disruption in the Middle East, including disruption to maritime trade through the Strait of Hormuz, has highlighted how quickly geopolitical events can affect energy and infrastructure supply chains. 

The fragility of this system has direct implications for Australia. Industry commentary has warned that disruption to crude oil and bitumen supply chains can lead to cancelled supply commitments, force majeure claims, tightening availability, stock depletion risks and material price escalation. The same pressures can also affect diesel, which is essential to road construction through quarry haulage, asphalt plant operations, pavers, rollers, bitumen sprayers and logistics.

Against this backdrop, Alpha provides  a highly differentiated strategic position. The project is not simply a resource opportunity; it is a potential domestic supply-chain solution for a product that is essential to Australia’s infrastructure base. If Greenvale can successfully produce and certify a C-170 bitumen product from Alpha material, the project could provide a foundation for a local bitumen supply pathway that reduces reliance on long-distance shipping, overseas refineries and geopolitically exposed crude oil corridors.

This specification point is important. Australia uses its own C-class bitumen designation under AS2008. International alternative supply is often produced to penetration-grade specifications that do not directly align with Australian requirements. The ability to produce a domestic C-170 product would therefore be strategically more valuable than simply sourcing replacement imported bitumen from other global markets.

Greenvale's Alpha Project is an advanced torbanite and cannelite project in Queensland (approximately 500km due west of Rockhampton), with the potential to become a strategically important domestic source of bitumen and oil-derived products. 

At a time when Australia’s road construction and maintenance sectors remain heavily (almost 100%) exposed to global crude oil supply, imported bitumen, international shipping and global refinery supply, Alpha represents a rare opportunity to advance a local resource into a potential Australian supply-chain solution.

The project hosts an Inferred Mineral Resource Estimate of approximately 28 million tonnes of combined torbanite and cannelite, representing 27.7 million barrels of synthetic oil equivalent. The resource was reported in accordance with the JORC Code 2012 and provides Greenvale with a substantial domestic hydrocarbon-bearing resource base from which the Company is seeking to develop a bituminous product capable of meeting Australian Class 170 bitumen specifications.

Greenvale’s current technical work is focused on a clear and commercially relevant objective: producing a bituminous product from the Alpha Project that can be independently certified to C-170 specification. C-170 is a core binder grade used in Australian road construction and maintenance, and therefore represents a direct link between the Alpha resource and a large, established domestic infrastructure market.

The Alpha deposit consists of two seams namely an Upper and Lower seam which sit at the base of the Colinlea Sandstone. The Lower seam is equivalent to the ‘E’ seam within the Colinlea Sandstone within the Galilee Basin. Seam structure of the deposit is simple with the two seams – the Upper and Lower seam – with an average interburden of 16 m. The interval between the two seams is dominantly quartzose to lithic sandstone with minor conglomerate, siltstone and claystone. The Upper Seam is classified as a cannel coal (cannelite) and has an average thickness of ~1 m and the Lower Seam has an average thickness of ~2 m. The lower seam is the main oil-yielding unit of the deposit. It consists of two main types of oil shale cannel coal (cannelite) and torbanite.

The Lower Seam can generally be split into three plies: 

 L1 – comprising a relatively clean cannel coal interval 

LT – comprising the main torbanite interval, including coal bands

L2 – comprising a relatively clean cannel coal interval.