01

Results at a Glance

• The Northern Territory's first cotton gin, located 34km north of Katherine

• Capacity for 150,000 to 200,000 bales annually
  1,000 bales per day at 24-hour operation

• 10T gantry crane integrated into the 21.5m high gin facility

• 97.5m long cottonseed storage facility with 10,000 tonnes of on-site storage
  

   

02

Client Overview

Northern Cotton operates the WANT Cotton Gin, the first cotton gin in the Northern Territory and the first in Northern Australia. Owned by a consortium of Western Australian and Northern Territory cotton growers and operated by Tipperary Group, the facility sits 34km north of Katherine on former Tarwoo Station land and processes cotton from across the NT and WA growing regions.

Before the gin existed, every cotton bale picked in the Top End had to be trucked thousands of kilometres east to gins in Queensland or south to NSW. The cost, the time, and the logistical pressure on harvest timing made it harder for the region's cotton sector to grow. A local gin would change that, and the case for building one had to overcome the demands of an extremely remote site, the scale of the equipment required, and the engineering challenges of housing industrial-scale cotton processing in open Top End terrain.

03

Key Outcomes

The Northern Territory now has its first cotton gin, with capacity to process between 150,000 and 200,000 bales per year and up to 1,000 bales per day at full 24-hour operation. NT and WA growers no longer need to send cotton east for processing, with the cottonseed produced as a by-product supplying local feedlots and pastoralists as a high-protein cattle feed.

The 21.5m high gin facility was custom-engineered to house a 10T gantry crane and a 600m² basement, with integrated heavy lifting capacity and environmental control systems built into the structure. The adjoining 97.5m cottonseed storage facility provides 10,000 tonnes of on-site capacity, giving the operation the buffer to manage seed sales independently of harvest timing.

Building at this scale in the Top End meant cranes mobilised from multiple locations and a strategic lift sequence to manage the height, the weight, and the remoteness of the site. The build was delivered as part of a coordinated effort with RivCott as the gin operator and Louis Dreyfus Company as the commercial partner.