Exploration is a cornerstone of shareholder value generation in Iluka and represents a significant investment commitment.
Exploration involves securing tenements and mining leases, drilling, geological resource modelling and evaluation work throughout South Australia, New South Wales, Victoria and Western Australia, as well as international exploration activities in the United States.
Regional and basin scale exploration strategies are designed to identify opportunities and locate high value heavy mineral strands and dunal deposits. In this regard, a major focus for Iluka is on its “Greenfields” exploration activities.
“Greenfields” exploration is designed to identify new resources within the company's extensive tenement holdings in the Murray Basin (Victoria/New South Wales) as well as the Eucla Basin (South Australia/Western Australia). Iluka has current tenement holdings of more than 94 thousand square kilometres across Australia.
“Brownfield” exploration activities are designed to extend the economic life or throughput at existing mining operations, thereby efficiently utilising existing infrastructure. This activity also attempts to ensure the sequencing of Mineral Resources to Ore Reserves to support mine planning and market supply forecasts. Activities in this regard are conducted in the Murray Basin (Victoria and New South Wales), and in Western Australia, particularly associated with the Eneabba mining and processing operations in the Mid West.
Exploration also has a major focus on delineating Mineral Resources as part of the commercial evaluation process for new developments which can then, following detailed feasibility studies, result in Mineral Resources and Ore Reserves, which are reported in accordance with the JORC Code, 2004.
A Project Generation stream, which involves desk top conceptual studies and new province reconnaissance work, is designed to identify and generate new, high value mineral sands growth opportunities both in Australia and internationally.
Iluka has also undertaken two “non-mineral sands” exploration programs in 2008, focussing on gold in Western Australia and uranium in South Australia.