WA Governor checks out town
During the WA Governor’s visit at Aurora Algae
The WA Governor took time from his busy schedule to organise a series of regional visits, including Karratha, to see what it is like in the area.
The focus of the visit was to look at schools, agriculture and initiatives from both big companies and small businesses in the area.
WA Governor, Malcolm McCusker, said it is easy enough to sit back in Perth and read the paper, but you don’t get a real grip on it.
“It’s not until you come here and see the incredible scale of the activities that are taking place,” he said.
“This at the moment is the epicenter of the Western Australian industry and of Australia.”
During his visit, some of the places the Governor stopped in at included Woodside, Rio Tinto, the Burrup Peninsular to check out the rock art and also Aurora Algae.
Aurora Algae founder Mathew Caspari said that this major visit would give him a chance to talk to the Governor about the plans on expanding the site.
“I think there is a very good interest from the Government of what we are doing, the support from the Government in the beginning has just continued to grow,” he said.
“We have been able to show some people the project in the past, and having the Governor come is a really big deal for us, so we are very pleased to show him around.”
Mr Caspari said that Aurora Algae is very unique and he was excited to show the Governor the work that they are doing.
“It’s really exciting and we view it as a new agricultural background,” he said.
“We will show the Governor the whole facility start to finish, but one of our highlights is our control system, so the process to actually highly automated.
“It is a more technology-advanced project than people might think.
“It’s not just some algae growing in some pond; it’s a very controlled operation to how we grow the algae.”
The WA Governor said Aurora Algae is a very good facility and it is very heartening to see that we have other industries that are developing here apart from simply mining resources.
“I am impressed by the amount of technology that has gone into the project,” he said.
“There is at least three different areas of expertise, that is something that hasn’t been done before.”
Aurora Algae will begin stage one of their 400ha expansion project mid-2013.
Tags: Aurora Algae, Echo, Malcolm McCusker, News, Pilbara, pilbaranews, WA Governor
