The Premises is located within the central part of the northern Perth Basin, a deep linear trough of
sedimentary rocks that is bounded to the east by the Darling Fault and composed of up to 12 km of
Permian to Quaternary sediments. The regional stratigraphy indicates three distinct depositional cycles in the sedimentary succession, with each cycle separated by a major unconformity in the form of an erosional surface.

The mineralised ore that comprises the Cataby deposit is hosted in the Late Tertiary Yoganup Formation. In the southern portion of the Premises, south of Mimegarra Rd, the mineralised deposits are underlain by the Leederville Formation, whilst in the north are underlain by Yarragadee sediments. A small portion of the south-eastern section of the deposit is likely to be underlain by the Mesozoic sediments of the Parmelia Formation.

Basement materials
The Leederville, Parmelia and Yarragadee Formations consist of interbedded, weakly to well consolidated sandstone, siltstone, shale and claystone that, in the upper portions, have been deposited in a non-marine, primarily fluvial setting. The Leederville Formation sediments conformably overlie the Yarragadee and the Parmerlia Formations, and as such are considered to be in hydraulic continuity.

On the eastern margin of the deposit, the basement materials outcrop along the Gingin and Dandaragan Scarps.

Yoganup Formation
The mineralised sands of the Yoganup Formation unconformably overlie the Cretaceous Formations, resulting in an abrupt contact. The Yoganup Formation consists primarily of friable ‘beach’ sands which were deposited and developed during successive marine transgression and regression events. Given its predominantly sandy texture, it hosts the regional aquifer in a semiconfined system.

Guildford Formation
Following the last regression of sea levels in the Pliocene (Late Tertiary), alluvial, fluvial and colluvial conditions were favoured resulting in the deposition of the Guildford Formation. These conditions continued throughout the Pleistocene resulting in the development of thick (up to 30m) beds of primarily sandy clay to clay sediments directly overlying the sandy Yoganup Formation. Isolated zones of sand exist within the clayey Guildford sediments, in response to heterogeneous parent materials. These sandy zones are currently saturated resulting in isolated regions of groundwater within the predominately unsaturated clays.

Bassendean Sands
Unconformably overlying the Guildford Formation are a series of aeolian sand dunes corresponding to the Bassendean Dunal System. These dunes represent an eastern extension of the more widespread dunal system on the Swan Coastal Plain and often attain thicknesses of up to 10 m, playing an important role in controlling surface water movement
throughout the region.

The mining and processing operations incorporate conventional dry mining, followed by wet screening and gravity separation.

Many of the pits will be mined to a basement level that is below the natural groundwater table and dewatering will be required to facilitate dry mining conditions. Where the dewatering rate exceeds the project’s water demand, excess water will be returned to the aquifer via infiltration basins, and reinjection bores where required.

Mine voids will be backfilled progressively throughout the life-of-mine by tailings and overburden.

The Cataby deposit is predominantly a large undeveloped high strip, low grade ilmenite deposit. Topsoil and subsoil will be pre-stripped and stockpiled separately, or placed on areas undergoing rehabilitation. Overburden removed using a combination of scrapers, excavators and trucks, and stockpiled or placed directly into the mine void, or used for the construction of earthen bunds, infrastructure pads and internal roads.

Mining occur on a 24-hour, 7 days per week basis to an approximate depth of 60 m below ground level (mbgl). Mining will be conducted in 16 pit areas, with some pits being contiguous with each other. At least 2 pits mined concurrently.

The general sequence of mining operations is outlined below:
- vegetation clearing and topsoil / subsoil stripping;
- overburden removal, followed by extraction of mineral sands ore using dozers, or excavators and trucks;
- progressive backfilling of mine voids by a combination of sand tailings, blended codisposal of the sand and clay streams, and overburden; and
- progressive rehabilitation behind the advancing mining operation.

Processing occur on a 24-hour, 7 days per week basis and involve the two MUPs feeding the two SSPs, prior to an ore slurry being delivered to the WCP. The MUPs will be fed ore from the pit basement by dozer-push method or direct excavation and incorporate a sizer/screening unit to reduce the ore to a pumpable slurry. The SSPs will utilise trommel and scrubbers to remove oversize and re-slurry the ore for pumping to the WCP.

The WCP use a combination of wet gravity and magnetic techniques to separate magnetic and non-magnetic HMC from the screened ore.

Wet Concentration Plant
Ore initially pass through a series of hydro-cyclones to separate out clay fines (nominally less than 53 microns), followed by banks of gravity spirals where the heavy minerals with specific gravities >3.5 flow to the inside of the spirals and separate from the principal waste mineral quartz, which has a specific gravity <3 and travel towards the outside of the spirals. This process will ........