Notifications and Reporting Environment Incidents

Notification and reporting of environmental incidents

Duty holders have a legal obligation under the Offshore Petroleum Greenhouse Gas Storage (Environment) Regulations 2023 to report incidents to NOPSEMA within a specified period of time, depending on the impact or potential impact to the environment.

Reportable incident

A reportable environmental incident means an incident relating to the activity that has caused or has the potential to cause moderate to significant environmental damage. These are defined in the titleholder's environment plan.

The titleholder is required to provide an oral notification to NOPSEMA as soon as practicable and no later than 2 hours, of a reportable environmental incident occurring.

The titleholder must provide a written notification as soon as practicable, and in any case, not later than 3 days after the first occurrence of the reportable incident, or another period specified by NOPSEMA.

A written record of the notification is also required to be submitted to NOPSEMA as soon as practicable after the oral notification of the incident and must contain all information specified under the Environment Regulations.

The titleholder must also provide a copy of the report, within 7 days of giving the written report to NOPSEMA, to NOPTA (via email to resources@nopta.gov.au) and the department of the responsible State or Territory Minister.

NOPSEMA, may by written request, require the titleholder to submit additional written reports, after the initial written report is received.

Please submit written reportable incident reports using our Secure File Transfer service or by email to submissions@nopsema.gov.au.

To orally notify NOPSEMA of a reportable environmental incident: 1300 674 472.

Recordable incidents

A recordable environmental incident means a breach of an environmental performance outcome or standard in the environment plan that applies to the activity and is not a reportable incident.

A written report of all recordable incidents must be provided to NOPSEMA as soon as practicable after the end of the calendar month, and in any case, not later than 15 days after the end of the calendar month. The written report must contain all information specified under the Environment Regulations.

If no recordable incidents have occurred, a 'nil incident' report should be submitted to NOPSEMA. Please submit monthly recordable incident reports using our Secure File Transfer service or by email to submissions@nopsema.gov.au.

Notification and reporting of commencement and completion of activities

Notification of the start and end of an activity (Regulation 54)

Regulation 54 of the Environment Regulations requires that:

• a titleholder must notify NOPSEMA that an activity is to commence at least 10 days before the activity commences; and
• a titleholder must notify NOPSEMA that an activity is completed within 10 days after the completion.

Notification of the end of operation of an environment plan (Regulation 46)

Regulation 46 of the Environment Regulations provides that the operation of an environment plan ends when the titleholder notifies NOPSEMA that:

• the activity or activities to which the plan relates have ended; and
• all of the obligations under the environment plan have been completed; and
• NOPSEMA accepts the notification.

Titleholders may provide NOPSEMA with written notification of commencement and completion dates and/or the end of operation of an environment plan directly by email, letter, or by using the forms available under 'Quick Links'.

Please submit written notifications using our SecureFile Transfer service or by email to submissions@nopsema.gov.au