What this document is
A single-page action instrument: the one thing to authorise, and why the lead time makes it worth starting now.
- Brisbane Landfill receives about 250,000 tonnes a year. A 400 TPD Standard Deployment takes 146,000 of them; 800 TPD takes all of it.
- Carbotura pays the Council a Circular Royalty™ of A$170–256/t in Year 1 against a A$142–213/t Beneficiation Fee, rising one percentage point a year, uncapped, for a 30-year minimum term.
- One action: authorise an LOI/MOU and open a Joint Working Group, so the option is specified while the levy is still climbing.
What recycling and green bins cannot reach still goes to landfill
Brisbane City Council runs Australia’s largest residential waste service, more than 900,000 bins. Its own engineered landfill at Rochedale receives around 250,000 tonnes a year. Kerbside recycling diverted about 65,000 tonnes in 2024–25, and the citywide green bin rollout completed in late 2025 is expected to divert 65,000 to 80,000 tonnes more. What remains is the residual, and every landfilled tonne carries the Queensland levy: A$125 in 2025–26, rising A$10 a year to A$165 in 2029–30.
Carbotura was built for the part of the stream that recycling and organics cannot finish. Advanced Circular Manufacturing (ACM) takes delivered residual and converts it into specification-grade manufactured products — synthetic graphite, graphene compounds, recovered metals and minerals, and net-positive ultrapure water. It is a manufacturing operation, not incineration, not energy from waste, not pyrolysis and not gasification. No oxygen enters the process, so nothing burns; there is no stack and no ash, and Carbotura does not sell power, electricity or hydrogen.
On cost we compare against one thing only: the levy, and we will be direct about it. At the floor of our range, the Beneficiation Fee is A$142 a tonne (US$100). The Queensland levy alone is A$125 a tonne today, so today the fee is higher than the levy by itself. The levy rises A$10 a year while the fee escalates 2.5%, and the levy passes the fee floor in 2028–29, reaching A$165 in 2029–30. The levy also excludes the cost of running a landfill. We do not claim a saving, because the Council’s own landfill cost per tonne is not published and the State’s offset arrangements for household material are not ours to assert.
What the Council receives is separate. Beginning 13 months after Carbotura’s receipt of the first Beneficiation Fee payment, Carbotura pays the Council a Circular Royalty™ starting at A$170–256 a tonne and rising one percentage point every year, uncapped, for a 30-year minimum term. The fee and the royalty are two independent transactions, reported separately and in full, and never netted against each other. Alongside that: no Council capital at any phase and no Council permitting burden.
Why Brisbane, and why now
Brisbane operates its own landfill and receives the residual directly. A single counterparty with a single delivery point is the simplest possible basis for a Circular Supply Agreement.
A$125 a tonne in 2025–26, A$10 more every year, A$165 in 2029–30. Each year the residual stays in landfill costs more than the last, on a schedule anyone can read.
The Council of Mayors (SEQ) has asked the ACCC to authorise joint procurement for more than a million tonnes a year across 11 councils, and estimates the earliest facility at eight to ten years after approval. We are not proposing to replace that process. How a bilateral agreement sits alongside it is for the Council to decide.
ACM takes material as received, with no pre-sort requirement and no clean-stream specification at the gate. What is left in the red-lid bin after recycling and green bins is what it is built for.
A Standard Deployment is 12 to 24 months from permit issuance to Commercial Operation, because ACM modules are manufactured and replicated rather than custom-built on site.
The structure, stated once
The Beneficiation Fee and the Circular Royalty™ are independent gross transactions with different payers. They are reported separately and never netted against one another.
The same physical mass is counted once in each of three dimensions — asset, revenue, attributes — and never summed as three independent masses.
Build-Own-Operate. Carbotura funds 100% of capital at every phase. The counterparty commits feedstock, not money.
One Circular Supply Agreement
+ Circular Royalty™
- Beneficiation Fee: A$142–213/t · set at Term Sheet against the verified FWDC · 2.5%/yr escalator
- Circular Royalty™: 120% of the current-year Beneficiation Fee in Year 1 (A$170–256/t, Year 1), +1pp/yr, uncapped
- Royalty commencement: 13 months after the first Beneficiation Fee payment, rolling monthly on delivered tonnage
- Perpetual CSA, 30-year minimum term · Build-Own-Operate · zero counterparty capital
- Feedstock transfers under the CSA — ownership and liability pass at collection or delivery
- Accounting basis: Australian Accounting Standards (AASB)
Carbotura is a development-stage company. No Carbotura facility is at or past Commercial Operation Date anywhere in the world. The first-of-a-kind plant is in Pennsylvania, USA, under a 30-year Circular Supply Agreement executed in January 2025; it is in deployment now, with commercial operation targeted for late 2027 to early 2028.
We have not asked any counterparty to take that on trust. The CSA carries a condition precedent: an operating facility meeting our stated claims and standards. Until that condition is satisfied, the counterparty is not held to performance. The first Feedstock Provider executed on that basis, and the clause is available for Council’s lawyers to read.
For Brisbane the practical point is that the first plant will be operating before any decision here has to be made.
Key figures at a glance
Circular Royalty™ projections by phase
Beneficiation Fee and Circular Royalty™ shown independently per the Separate Transaction Principle. No figure on this page nets one against the other.
| Capacity | Annual TPY | Beneficiation Fee · Year 1 | Circular Royalty™ · Year 1 basis | 30-Year Gross Royalty | Direct FTE |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 400 TPD ← entry point Phase Phase Initial | 146,000 | A$20.74M | A$24.89M | ~A$1,241M ESTIMATED | ~100 |
| 800 TPD Phase Phase Medium | 292,000 | A$41.48M | A$49.77M | ~A$2,483M ESTIMATED | ~200 |
Fee range A$142–213/t; figures modelled at the A$142.05 floor. Circular Royalty™ at 120% of the current-year fee in Year 1, +1 percentage point per year uncapped. The two are independent gross transactions and are never netted. Comparator is the Queensland Level 1 levy alone (A$125/t in 2025–26), a floor on the cost of landfilling a tonne. Carbotura’s programme ranges are set in USD (US$100–150 fee) and converted at the RBA rate of 30 October 2026 (A$1 = US$0.7040). At the floor the fee is above today’s levy alone; the levy passes it in 2028–29. Figures ILLUSTRATIVE until Term Sheet execution.