Orebody Modelling and Strategic Mine Planning.R. Dimitrakopoulos, Editor. Pp 402. The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy Spectrum Series 14. Second edition. 2007. ISBN 978-1-920806-76-7. Price (outside Australia) hardcopy A$80.00, CD-ROM A$60.00.

This volume follows the eponymous conference held in Perth, Western Australia, in November 2004. This second edition “includes new developments.” One-half of the case studies named in the title apply to Western Australia, with the remainder being scattered over other continents. The majority of articles discuss principles, so the value of the book is not impaired by a parochial focus. Authors are similarly distributed, and all regions have their champions. Authors include academics, senior managers, consultants, but few at operational level. The printed text is very crisp and eminently legible. There is abundant illustration, all in black and white. The quality of figures and photos is variable, generally fair, but some line work is quite pixelated. Some diagrams are formerly color slides from the conference and so have unintelligible black-and-white scales. Some are too small. References are listed for each paper and appear to be adequately modern. There is no subject index. The volume contains 8 chapters and 50 articles. The chapters are summarized as follows: Mine optimization incorporates the certainty that variables are uncertain. A secondary product represented as primary-product equivalent is treated by a risk valuation method …