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A one million dollar Australian research project at the University of Melbourne will develop a less costly and environmentally safer process for producing titanium dioxide from the mineral ilmenite. A University spokesman said a pilot plant wold be used to produce about a tonne of the product a day. He said that an advantage of the process was that it could achieve a high level of extraction from any grade of ilmenite; whereas existing methods could handle only certain grades. “We expect our process to achieve a lower unit cost than either of the two existing commercial processes and — unlike these processes — it will have no adverse environmental effects.”