Global miner Rio Tinto (ASX: RIO) has been partly reassured by revisions to the federal government's controversial resource tax.

According to chief executive Tom Albanese yesterday, the company would now push ahead with investments in Australia.

He told the Sky Business Channel, "It's not perfect, but I would say it's something that allows Rio Tinto to make the investments that we want to make in Australia."

"That's all we can expect, and that's all we're concerned with.

"We want to have the ability to continue to invest in Australia."

The mining giant announced last week it would shell out a further $US790 million ($860m) to grow iron ore capacity at its Pilbara operations in Western Australia.

It has approved a total of $US1 billion in the past weeks to fund the last phase of a multi-tier expansion project that focuses on increasing Rio Tinto's Cape Lambert port handling capacity from 80 million tonnes to 180 million tonnes by 2016.

The Anglo-Australian miner reported a first-half net profit of $US5.85bn for the half year to June 30, putting it on track for a record annual result.

It outlined intentions for up to $US13bn in capital spending over 18 months.

"A large portion of that's going to be driven by what we see as a strong, long-term positive trend for Asian demand, Chinese demand of products that we produce," Mr Albanese said.

"If we look at the ability to ramp up the Pilbara, if we look at our other iron ore operations, whether they're in Canada, our future operations we'd expect to see in Simandou, possibly in India, I think we have a very strong profile of growth, not just the next five years, but well beyond that in iron ore," he said.