On 28 April 2020, a series of amendments to the offshore petroleum and greenhouse gas storage (OPGGS) regime came into force:
- the OPGGS (Miscellaneous Amendments) Act 2019,
- the OPGGS (Regulatory Levies) Amendment Act 2019, and
- the OPGGS Legislation Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Regulations 2020.
The key amendments are expected to:
- Transfer regulatory oversight of greenhouse gas wells and environmental management from the responsible Commonwealth Minister to NOPSEMA.
- Enable NOPSEMA to undertake inspections without a warrant to monitor compliance by titleholders with well integrity obligations under the OPGGS Act and regulations.
- Impose well activity levies on submission of five-yearly revisions of well operations management plans (WOMP) to reflect previous changes to well-related regulations to require five-yearly WOMP revisions, rather than submissions of a new WOMP every five years.
- Future proof references to regulations in the OPGGS Act and the Levies Act.
The legislative and regulatory amendments and associated explanatory materials are available as follows:
