Australia’s supply-chain debate has focused heavily on lithium, rare earths, and nickel. However, one upstream material remains largely outside this conversation: high-purity silica sand.
Silica sand and quartz sand are both valued because they contain silicon dioxide, or SiO₂, the basic material that can be processed into glass, silicon materials, solar-panel inputs, and semiconductor-adjacent industrial products. In simple terms, all quartz sand is silica sand with very high silica purity, but not all silica sand is pure quartz sand. In this article, “silica sand” is the broader governance category, while quartz sand refers to trade data and industrial applications. High-purity silica may look like an ordinary industrial input, but it sits at the base of solar glass, silicon materials, electronics, and semiconductor-adjacent supply chains. For Australia, the issue is not simply whether it can export more white sand, but whether it can govern how this material enters Indo-Pacific technology systems.
This requires treating high-purity silica sand not only as a traded mineral, but as a supply-chain governance category. One way to make this shift operational is a “silica-sand origin passport,” which could link each export batch to mine origin, purity level, processing method, water use, environmental obligations, Indigenous benefit-sharing, port-transfer routes, and broad end-use category. Such a mechanism would not close Australia’s silica trade. Instead, it would make openness more conditional, trusted, and strategically legible.
According to OEC, Australia is the world’s second-largest exporter of silica sands and quartz sands, a trade category that captures closely related SiO₂-based materials, with exports worth US$216 million. Australian silica sand mainly flows to China, Japan, and Taiwan, among the Indo-Pacific’s most important manufacturing and technology economies. As the three largest importers of Australian silica sand, China, Japan, and Taiwan represent three different forms of demand: large-scale clean-energy manufacturing, trusted high-end materials supply, and upstream resilience in semiconductor and AI hardware ecosystems.
Entering the Chinese Market: Large-Scale Solar Manufacturing
China imports about US$69.05 million, or 1.289 billion kilograms, of silica sands and quartz sands from Australia, making it one of the largest destinations for this category of Australian exports. China’s demand for Australian silica sand is mainly tied to value chains for photovoltaic glass, solar-module materials, and high-purity silicon materials processing.
Australia’s Industrial Minerals Ltd previously signed a two-stage memorandum of understanding with Shandong Hongbote Solar Technology Co. Ltd., with the aim of supplying high-purity silica sand from the Stockyard project in Western Australia to China’s rapidly growing photovoltaic-glass market. China draws Australian silica sand into the solar industrial chain. According to the IEA, China accounts for more than 80% of global manufacturing capacity across multiple stages of solar-panel production. When Australian silica sand enters China, it also enters one of the world’s most concentrated photovoltaic manufacturing systems.
For Australia, the Chinese market is both an opportunity and a challenge. Chinese demand can provide a stable export market and commercial momentum for Australian silica-sand projects. However, the challenge is whether Australia can build domestic capabilities around silica-sand refining, glass manufacturing, solar materials, and supply-chain governance.
Japanese and Taiwanese Imports: High-End Supply from a Trusted Partner
Unlike China’s large-scale industrial demand, Japan’s demand reflects materials security and high-end industrial supply chains. In 2024, Japan imported about US$62.21 million, or 898 million kilograms, of silica sands and quartz sands from Australia, making it the second-largest buyer of Australian silica sand. After importing Australian silica sand, Japan mainly uses it in high-end materials industries, such as semiconductor-related materials.
Cape Flattery Silica Mines, a subsidiary of Mitsubishi Corporation, has supplied silica sand to Japan since 1968, and its products have long served industries such as glass manufacturing. In the Albany area, the existing AustSand operation adjacent to ASQ’s Albany project exported around 240,000 tonnes of SiO₂ sand through Albany Port in 2016. According to ASQ, the sand is understood to be exported to Korea and Japan and used in the glass industries, including Thin-Film Transistor Liquid Crystal Display (TFT-LCD) applications. Japan’s demand emphasises stability, purity, long-term contracts, and trusted supply. It elevates the strategic significance of Australian white sand: Australian silica sand is becoming an upstream security node in Japan’s systems for precision manufacturing, clean energy, and electronic materials.
However, stable exports do not automatically equal industrial upgrading. They may secure Australia’s role as a reliable supplier of raw material, but they do not by themselves move Australia higher up the value chain or generate domestic capacity in processing, certification, logistics, and downstream manufacturing. Australia’s policy priority should be to design an “open but conditional” form of supply-chain governance. The aim is to keep the silica sand trade open to trusted partners while ensuring that long-term supply relationships also generate domestic value through processing, infrastructure, certification, environmental safeguards, and Indigenous benefit-sharing. Otherwise, Australia risks remaining a reliable but low-value supplier of raw material, rather than using silica sand to strengthen its position in silicon-glass, photovoltaic, and semiconductor-adjacent supply chains. For example, while maintaining long-term supply contracts, Australia could encourage Japanese, South Korean, and Taiwanese firms to participate in upstream activities within Australia. It could also set clearer requirements for local value creation in ports, energy, environmental approvals, and Indigenous benefit-sharing, while incorporating silica sand into a broader “silicon-glass-photovoltaics-semiconductor materials” policy framework.
As Australia’s third-largest silica-sand importer, Taiwan imports about US$47.49 million of silica sands and quartz sands from Australia. Taiwan’s significance lies in the industrial position: a core node in global semiconductor foundry services, advanced chip manufacturing, and the expansion of AI hardware. In Taiwan’s semiconductor and electronic-materials ecosystem, Australia’s high-purity silica sand and quartz materials help Taiwan build advanced electronics manufacturing, and Taiwan also helps Australian silica sand move from the realm of “resource trade” into the construction of “technology infrastructure.”
From Resource Exports to Supply-Chain Governance
For Australia, the large-scale export of silica sand has increased its strategic value as a trusted raw material supplier in the Indo-Pacific. It has also raised questions about how to approach silica-sand governance. Specifically, how to build a balanced resource-governance framework for silica sand that is open, trusted, and sustainable while avoiding low-value lock-in.
The first approach requires reclassification. The aim is to make Australia’s existing critical minerals framework more granular. Australia should distinguish high-purity silica sand, semiconductor and photovoltaic-grade high-purity quartz, and silicon precursor materials. According to Geoscience Australia, the silica used to extract silicon for commercial manufacturing, especially in computer chips and solar panel production, needs to have a SiO2 purity that exceeds 98%. This means that, at the policy level, construction sand, glass sand, low-iron photovoltaic glass sand, and high-purity silicon precursor materials should no longer be treated as the same thing. The clearer the classification, the more precise the governance.
Second, Australia should operationalise the “silica-sand origin passport” as the practical mechanism through which this open-but-conditional approach would work. The goal is to make high-purity silica exports more transparent, traceable, and strategically legible. By linking export batches to mine origin, purity level, processing and transfer routes, environmental obligations, Indigenous benefit-sharing, and broad end-use categories, such a passport would allow Australia to keep its silica trade open while clarifying the conditions under which openness serves national industrial, environmental, and strategic objectives. In this sense, the passport is not simply a documentation tool; it is a supply-chain governance instrument that helps Australia move from being a passive raw-material exporter to a more active rule-shaper in Indo-Pacific silicon-based supply chains.
The last approach is to link public support to domestic value addition, that is, to ensure that silica-sand projects supported by the state contribute not only to raw-material exports, but also to local processing, manufacturing linkages, employment, technology development, and broader industrial upgrading. For silica-sand projects that seek fast-track approvals, infrastructure support, export finance, or access to public funding, the Australian government should require clear plans for domestic processing and industrial upgrading. For example, the Solar Sunshot program launched by the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) shows that Australia already has a policy entry point for connecting silica-sand resources with domestic photovoltaic manufacturing.
Jing Ge is an instructor at Florida International University. She also works as a research assistant at the Jack D Gordon Institute to provide policy analysis. Her research interests include foreign policy, Asia-Pacific regional security studies, great power competition, and global governance. She has written for several publications, including The National Interest, The Diplomat, The Interpreter, and American Purpose. Her academic work has been published in many international peer-reviewed journals.
This article is published under a Creative Commons License and may be republished with attribution.
