In the agricultural heartlands of southern New South Wales, a strategic partnership between Supagas and Southern Cotton has been redefining benchmarks for industry collaboration and innovation for over 12 years.
This alliance not only supports the cotton gin operations at Southern Cotton but also significantly contributes to the region’s economic prosperity.
John Scanu, bulk LPG business development manager at Supagas, was instrumental in initiating this partnership when he discovered plans for a new cotton gin in the area and approached Roger Commins, one of the owners.
However, a significant hurdle was the lack of natural gas infrastructure in such remote locations, which posed a challenge that Supagas addressed with a viable solution.
“Bulk LPG is vital to regional businesses,” Scanu says.
“Due to the absence of natural gas in certain areas, the cost of extending natural gas pipelines to such remote locations is prohibitively expensive.”
This underlined the critical need for an alternative energy solution that Supagas was poised to provide.
“We designed and installed a 90,000-litre gas tank specifically tailored to meet the expanding needs of Southern Cotton, ensuring they could scale their operations efficiently and effectively,” Scanu says.
This infrastructure not only supports the gin itself but also fuels further economic activity, as the same gas supply powers their neighbouring businesses, Whitton Malt House and Voyager Craft Malt.
Southern Cotton executive director Kate O’Callaghan describes the company’s relationship with Supagas as being indispensible.
“They understand the variability of our needs,” she says.
“The gas is always in the tank, ready to burn when we need to dry cotton.”
This level of reliability is critical as downtime can be extraordinarily costly, with Supagas’s responsive support being invaluable.
“There have been some really cold mornings when there were problems with the condenser and Supagas are just a call away to help us out,” O’Callaghan says.
Scanu exemplified this commitment to service, recalling an instance where he was called outside business hours.
“I’ve been called out here at 6am on a Sunday because the business had issues with their regulator,” he says.
“It’s not a problem; you come out and do what you can to keep the business running.”
The impact of this partnership extends well beyond operational metrics, as this productivity has added over $1 billion into the local economy, enhancing the financial wellbeing of not just the cotton growers but also the surrounding businesses.
“We produced 166,234 bales in the first season, the most bales ever in a one-year-old gin and over the last 12 years, we’ve ginned 2 million bales,” O’Callaghan says.
Addressing the unpredictability of gas needs, a challenge that Supagas adeptly manages, O’Callaghan says there is considerable variability involved.
“The biggest challenge we had in terms of gas supply is the unknown,” she says.
“We didn’t know how much gas we needed. We don’t know how much gas we need in any given week.”
Despite this, Supagas ensures that Southern Cotton never faces a shortage, which is crucial for maintaining continuous operations.
“If it’s wet cotton and we need a gas truck every day, then it’s here every day,” O’Callaghan says.
“We’re employing 50 to 60 seasonal staff whose jobs rely on the factory operating. So we can’t afford to stop.
“Supagas has been very important in making our business viable, and our business is only viable because of the partnerships that we have run throughout the region. Supagas is part of that friendship.”
Scanu highlights Supagas’s commitment to exceptional service, detailing their proactive ethos, while describing the comprehensive support it can offer.
“At Supagas, our ethos is ‘Yes We Can.’ No matter the challenge, Supagas steps up to the plate,” Scanu says.
“We can provide you with the gas you require. We can give you the gas that’s used sustainably, safely.”
For a closer look at Supagas and Southern Cotton’s effective partnership, watch the case study video below.