PERTH (miningweekly.com) – Iron-ore miner Gindalbie Metals' operating arm Karara Mining is investigating a revised environmental assessment for parts of its Karara project, in Western Australia.

Karara Mining has established a new consultative process to review the conservation values of a number of areas within the company’s Midwest tenement holding, following discussions with the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA).

The Karara conservation and mining initiative (KCMI) represented a significant proactive initiative to identify and share new information that has come to light on the landscape values and floristic communities within the Midwest region and bring it to the attention of key stakeholders, Gindalbie said on Wednesday.

One of the first objectives of the KCMI would be to reassess the conservation values of a number of areas within Karara Mining’s broader Midwest tenement holding containing potential direct shipping ore hematite opportunities.

The key outcomes of the process will then be used to decide whether these areas, which include Mungada Ridge, should be put forward for a revised formal environmental assessment by the EPA. Mungada Ridge is located in close proximity to Karara’s existing magnetite mining operations.

During the original environmental approvals process for the greater Karara iron-ore project, Karara Mining withdrew from assessment the hematite deposits located on Mungada Ridge prior to the completion of the EPA assessment process.

The 2007 strategic review of the banded iron formation ranges of the Midwest and Goldfields recommended that a further review of conservation and mining objectives in the Midwest region be undertaken in three years based on any new information – including new science.

Gindalbie said that extensive new information had become available since the strategic review was completed, which includes new scientific information on the landscape values and biological communities on Mungada Ridge.

Mungada Ridge encompasses five hematite deposits with an inferred resource of 13.1-million tonnes at 60.7% iron. Because of its proximity to the existing mining operations and rail infrastructure at Karara, these deposits could be economically mined, processed and exported.