The ongoing decarbonisation efforts of the steelmaking industry, together with increasingly stringent climate policies, are driving a growing demand for high-grade ironmaking feedstocks. However, the availability of such materials remains limited. According to the 2020 IEEFA report, only around 3 per cent of the global seaborne iron ore supply qualifies as direct-reduction (DR) grade (Nicholas and Basirat, 2022). Projections by Bloomberg New Energy Finance further suggest that achieving a Net Zero pathway could require up to a tenfold increase in the supply of DR-grade pellets by 2050, unless hydrogen-based direct reduction (H2-DRI) technologies evolve to accommodate lower-grade ores (Nicholas and Basirat, 2022). This anticipated supply–demand mismatch underscores the growing importance of strategies that enable the efficient utilisation of lower-grade iron ores, with significant implications for countries such as Australia, where iron ore exports are predominantly of lower grade.