In NSW all prospecting and mining activities must be carried out under an approved title granted under the Mining Act (NSW). The term ‘title’ refers to all exploration and mining authorities, authorisations, tenements, licences, leases, and claims. Acronyms are often used to describe a title, e.g. AUTH, EL, PEL, ML.

An approved title gives the holder the right to conduct exploration activities or mining activities within a specified area according to the conditions defined in the Mining Act for each title type. A titleholder can be an individual, group of individuals, a company, or group of companies, and some titles are held by the NSW Government.

‘Current’ or ‘active’ titles are currently in force and include titles granted under older versions of the Mining Act. Some title type e.g. CMLs have been granted in the 1973 and 1992 versions of the Mining Act, leading to duplicate title identifications e.g. CML6 (1973) and CML6 (1992). The year of the Act is essential in understanding the legislation and conditions relevant to that particular title.

When a title expires or is cancelled, suspended or revoked it becomes ‘inactive'/'historical’. At this time it is moved to the historic titles data set.

Titles in this dataset are onshore titles only (onshore or within 3km of the NSW coastline). All other offshore titles are regulated by the Federal Government.

As different exploration and mining activities can coexist over the same area, titles can overlap e.g. exploration for Group 1 minerals and exploration for Group 2 may occur in the same area under different title holders. Where this overlap occurs, a cooperation agreement must be in place between the coexisting title holders. Approval from the Minister for Regional NSW, or a department delegate, is required.