The Australian Workers' Union (AWU) stated that workers at a copper refinery in North Queensland are planning to go on strike due to nearly a year of unsuccessful negotiations with Glencore over pay and working conditions. The union said that if the labor negotiations scheduled for Thursday still fail to address workers' demands, employees at the Townsville refinery will begin striking from Friday.

[SMM Morning Meeting Summary: Sticky US Inflation Persisted, and the Center of LME Zinc Moved Lower] Overnight, LME zinc opened at $3,313/mt. In early trading, LME zinc maintained a fluctuating trend and touched a high of $3,352/mt. Entering the European trading session, LME zinc quickly fell to a low of $3,296.5/mt. In the night session, LME zinc gradually recovered its losses and fluctuated upward, hovering near the daily average line, before closing down at $3,315.5/mt, down $26.5/mt, or 0.79%. Trading volume decreased to 91,642 lots, and open interest increased by 494 lots to 217,000 lots.

Australian homes and businesses added 2.6 GW of rooftop solar in 2025, pushing the national total to 28.3 GW—surpassing the country's entire 22.5 GW coal-fired generation fleet. While solar installation volumes cooled by 15% to roughly 255,000 units as the market matures, the energy storage sector saw unprecedented growth driven by the federal government's $7.3 billion 'Cheaper Home Batteries' program. A record-breaking 183,245 battery units were installed in the second half of 2025 alone, a four-fold increase year-on-year that nearly matched the total sales of the previous five years combined.

Recently, in the environmental assessment campaign of Chongqing Iron & Steel (Group) Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Chongqing Iron & Steel Group"), Chongqing Iron & Steel Group Transportation Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Chongqing Iron & Steel Transportation Company"), a subsidiary of Chongqing Iron & Steel Group, collaborated with Yuhong Chuangneng to deploy 50 hydrogen-powered heavy-duty trucks equipped with Guohong Hydrogen Energy's fuel cell systems, establishing a clean transportation network covering industrial materials such as steel slag and steel products. The transportation scope of this batch of hydrogen-powered heavy-duty trucks covers over 10 key areas in Chongqing, including Changshou, Bishan, and Fuling, with a daily average transportation volume of 6,500 mt and a daily carbon reduction of 5.3 mt, effectively addressing the core challenge of "carbon footprint management in transportation links" in the environmental assessment of the steel industry. The 50 hydrogen-powered heavy-duty trucks performed exceptionally well in the rigorous field surveys and sample collection operations for environmental assessment conducted by Chongqing Iron & Steel Transportation Company. With their zero-carbon emissions throughout the entire process, they perfectly met the green requirements of environmental assessment, ensuring both transportation timeliness and avoiding secondary pollution during the assessment process. Currently, steel enterprises in China are accelerating the replacement of traditional internal combustion engine vehicles with hydrogen-powered heavy-duty trucks, adding new impetus to strive for ultra-low emission Class A environmental protection enterprises and achieve green and low-carbon development. This collaboration between Guohong Hydrogen Energy and Yuhong Chuangneng, through the large-scale application of hydrogen-powered heavy-duty trucks, has validated the maturity of hydrogen energy technology in heavy industry emission reduction scenarios. The established closed-loop system of "environmental protection assessment - technology validation - standard output" provides replicable experience for the green upgrading of the industry. In the future, Guohong Hydrogen Energy will continue to deepen the application innovation of hydrogen energy in the heavy industry sector, collaborate with more partners to jointly draw up a new blueprint for green development, and contribute hydrogen energy power to achieving the "dual carbon" goals!

【Hubei 30,000-Ton Battery Recycling Project Progresses】The second-stage environmental review was published for a Wuhan-based lithium battery recycling project (details identical to the fourth entry above).

【30,000-Ton Lithium Battery Recycling Project Launched in Hubei】An environmental impact assessment for a lithium battery recycling project by a Wuhan-based new energy company entered its second public review phase. With an investment of ￥30 million, the project will utilize existing workshops to build a 30,000-ton/year recycling line. Upon completion, it will process 30,000 tons of lithium batteries annually (including 7,800 tons of non-compliant batteries and 22,200 tons of electrode materials), contributing to resource circularity.