The current quarry operation occupies approximately 50.2 Ha out of Boral’s 82.5 Ha landholding and supplies concrete aggregates for projects across the greater metropolitan Melbourne area. The extension of the Pit to the East and South aims to increase the amount of resource that can be extracted within the current WA100 limit.

Boral is seeking to extend the exiting extraction boundary to increase the life of the Montrose quarry by approximately 30 years. The proposed extension will increase the current extraction area by approximately 12.5 hectares and will allow approx. 26 million tonnes of additional stone to be quarried.

The proposed development works can be described as follows:

• Staged removal of vegetation and waste rock.
• Removal of topsoil and overburden using mechanical excavators or similar equipment.
• Installation and upgrading of internal haul roads.
• Creation of a temporary access ramp.
• Extraction of rock by drilling and blasting - rock extraction will be undertaken using a multi-level open pit extraction method with blasting to reduce the rock to a manageable size.
• Removal of extracted rock - loaded into dump trucks for transport to the primary crusher located on the existing quarry area.

The project does not propose to change the location or operational activities at the quarry plant and stockyard. The operating hours, loadout and blasting activities will also remain the same.