Winchester South is located in Queensland near the township of Moranbah in the Central part of the Bowen Basin which contains numerous important coal producing intervals in the Permian stratigraphy. The sequences of economic interest for open cut mining include the Leichhardt seams and the Vermont Upper seam of the late Permian Rangal Coal Measures as well as the and Vermont Middle Lower seam of the Fort Cooper Coal Measure. The Goonyella Middle seams of the Moranbah Coal Measures are potential targets for underground mining. The main host-rock types of these sub-groups are sandstone, siltstone with minor stratigraphic layers of conglomerate, and tuffaceous bands.

Structurally the deposit is dominated by the north-south Winchester Syncline which has been itself affected by reverse and normal faulting.

The open cut portion (Rangal and Fort Cooper seams) of the deposit is located within the subcrops along the syncline margin.

Dimensions
The Rangal and Fort Cooper seams resources trends ~15 km northwest-southeast following the Winchester South syncline and is ~6km wide at its maximum. The seams’ depth below topography is generally less than 150 m.

The Moranbah Coal Measures resource in the south-west of the project area trends northwest southeast for ~10 km with a width of ~3 km and a depth from ~400 m to ~650 m below the topographic surface for the Moranbah Coal Measures seams.

The open cut mining areas for the Project would be mined through conventional truck and shovel mining methods. The open cut mining operational areas would generally include supporting infrastructure such as haul roads, bunding, embankments, soil stockpiles, hardstands and water management structures.

Mining operations would generally occur 24 hours per day, seven days per week, with open cut mining activities and general sequence entailing:

- progressive clearing of vegetation occurring on areas required for the mining operation in accordance with prescribed procedures;
- stripping and stockpiling of soil from disturbed areas for storage and reuse in future rehabilitation of the mine landforms in accordance with prescribed procedures;
- pre-stripping of weathered tertiary sediments (e.g. unconsolidated/friable overburden, including clays) using scrapers, excavators and trucks;
- drilling and blasting (using commercial products, with the principal blasting agent being ammonium nitrate fuel oil [ANFO] only to be conducted during the daytime) for fragmentation of competent overburden and interburden as waste rock;
- removal of waste rock and inter-seam partings to expose the underlying coal seams, and placement in out-of-pit waste rock emplacements, or as infill in the mine void behind advancing mining operations, using a combination of dozers, excavators and trucks;
- mining of coal and haulage to the ROM coal handling facilities u ........

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