In late February we received an update on the progress of the Bowen Pipeline from Director Sean Brown.
We are delighted to announce that on the 17th December 2025 we secured our State Ministerial Project draft conditions of approval. The next day we secured 2 sets of draft conditions of approval from the Office of the Coordinator-General.
This is the most significant Milestone in the entire Project. The Ministerial approval means that the Project moves from being a “great concept on paper” to a living breathing real Project that now has a life of its own.
In December 2025, during the last sitting week of the Federal Parliament, Carl Walker and Randal Ross (Juru elder) received advice that the Project needed to be Shovel Ready in September 2026 to be in the running for the Federal construction grant of 50% of the costs of construction.
Hence, the clock is ticking.
We are now progressing rapidly our Water Supply and will commence our Water Sales program in early April 2026.
As someone who has lived this Project for some 9 years, it is amazing to see what a change of State Government can do for a region, particularly a North Queensland region.
We wish to sincerely thank Minister Dale Last for being the projects unstinting champion and the Deputy Premier Jarrod Bleijie for his leadership and changing of the Government’s ethos to give the private sector a fair go. Premier Crisafulli is showing exceptional leadership in his drive to make his government accountable to the voters.
We thank Mayors Ry Collins and Pierina Dalle Cort for their ongoing championing of the Project. As always, we wish to thank your President, Carl Walker for his unstinting determination to ensure this Project is developed and constructed in a timely manner.
It takes a community and leadership at the highest levels to build a $700 million Project such as ours. This project is being built on the shoulders of the people who not only live in the region but all those who came before us, your parents, grandparents and the generations before.
Thank you once again to everyone who has contributed in words and actions to move this Project one major step closer to turning soil in 2027.
Sean Brown, Director, Bowen Pipeline Company.
