Australia’s tallow industry has been booming in recent years with exports now worth more than $1 billion.
The ASX-listed GrainCorp is Australia’s largest exporter, and in 2024 it celebrated 100 years of the tallow industry.
But how did a grains company get involved in rendered fat?
What is tallow?
Tallow is made from animal fat and is a by-product of the meat processing industry.
Historically it has been used in products such as soap and candles.
GrainCorp’s Jeff Summerville said a lot of people would know tallow as “dripping” and associate the product with good old-fashioned cooking.
“For those who are old enough to remember, tallow is what we used to have in the fridge. It was in Grandma’s lard tin for cooking,” he said.
Mr Summerville is GrainCorp’s head of agri-energy, and said it was the tallow industry’s evolution into biofuels that caught the company’s attention.
Liquid (inedible) tallow is rendered fat from livestock. (Supplied: Australian Renderers Association)
Tallow fuel
In 2012, GrainCorp bought a company called Gardner Smith for $302 million.
“Gardner Smith was created in the 1920s to service the abattoirs and find a home for tallow,” Mr Summerville said.
“So originally it would go around to the renderers, pick up the tallow and move it in drums back to England to make candles.”
He said in the 1970s and 80s the company sent a lot of product to China for soap making, but by 2010 the focus had shifted to the renewable fuel industry.
Anne Watling works at a laboratory in Pinkenba, where GrainCorp tests and processes tallow. (Supplied: GrainCorp)
“So for the past 15 years, we’ve seen the majority of Australia and New Zealand’s tallow moved into being a feedstock to make renewable diesel and sustainable aviation fuel,” he said.
“When GrainCorp purchased Gardner Smith it included the tallow trading but also an interesting business called Auscol, which is a collector of used cooking oil that is also a useful feedstock for renewable fuel.
“So that’s how GrainCorp has been in the tallow industry for 100 years.”
Mr Summerville said the majority of GrainCorp’s tallow was exported to Singapore and the United States.
GrainCorp exports tallow from its port at Pinkenba, Qld to overseas markets for use in renewable fuel. (Supplied: GrainCorp)
Future for tallow bright
Mr Summerville said the next five years looked promising for tallow for a number of reasons, including the Australian government’s budget commitment to create a domestic low-carbon liquid fuels industry.
“We think the future for tallow is particularly bright given the shift and the transition towards renewable fuel,” he said.
“There are already trucks getting around on renewable diesel made out of tallow and planes flying on sustainable aviation fuel made from tallow.
“So that’s really been the technology shift that’s allowed this industry to grow.”
Demand has also surged in the United States thanks to Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act, which offers federal subsidies to fuels that produce fewer emissions.
The legislation has created a boom in biofuel production and a rise in imported feedstocks such as tallow.
But when asked if Donald Trump was a fan of biofuels, Mr Summerville said there “was a lot of speculation”.
“We won’t know what will happen until Trump takes over in January,” he said.
“The Inflation Reduction Act has impacted on agriculture with a lot of soybeans and canola already going into the renewable sector and some big fuel companies have invested heavily.
“So it’s hard to speculate, but I think we’ll just have to wait and see what happens in late January.”
