The project lies within the Swan Coastal Plain, approximately 3 km west of the Darling Scarp (which is the surface expression of the Darling Fault). The Darling Fault separates the Precambrian Yilgarn Block sequences from the Phanerozoic strata of the Swan Coastal Plain. The fault has an estimated maximum displacement of 15 km and, as a result of erosion, lies approximately 1 to 2 km west of the present scarp.

The Swan Coastal Plain extends from the Darling Scarp to the Indian Ocean, and ranges up to 75 m above sea level. A narrow piedmont zone occurs at the base of the scarp comprising alluvial fans and remnants of two strand-line deposits: the Ridge Hill Sandstone and the Yoganup Formation. West of the piedmont zone lies an alluvial swathe up to 10 km wide, termed the Pinjarra Plain. The Pinjarra Plain, comprising the Guildford Formation, ranges in elevation from 6 to 50 m and is overlain to the west by a series of coastal sand dunes. The oldest of these sequences is the Pleistocene Bassendean Sand, which hosts the Keysbrook Mineral Sand Deposit.

The Guildford Formation is characterised by clay, loam, sand and gravel of alluvial origin, with variable laterisation and podsolization. The Bassendean Sand and Guildford Formation have a combined thickness of 10 to 15 m and unconformably overlie about 50 to 130 m of Creataceous Leederville Formation. In the western portion of the project area the Leederville Formation conformably overlies the Cretaceous South Perth Shale, and in the eastern part it conformably overlies the Jurassic Cattamarra Coal Measures.

The mineral sand deposit, which occurs within the Bassendean Sand, contains approximately 2.6% heavy minerals; principally leucoxene and zircon. MZI mine the deposit using conventional dry surface mining methods (i.e. excavator and dump trucks).

Keysbrook is a 24-hour / 7-day per week mining operation, using articulated dump trucks and an excavator operation to provide MZI with operational flexibility.

The ore is processed in two stages:
-primary processing is carried out in a wet
concentrator plant (WCP) at the mine to produce a Heavy Mineral Concentrate (HMC); and then
- the HMC is transported to a third party mineral separation plant in Picton, for separation into leucoxene and zircon products, which are then exported through the Bunbury and Fremantle Ports.