Australia's Maritime Jurisdiction and Continental Shelf Map

A map depicting Australia's maritime jurisdiction and extended continental shelf boundaries around the continent. It is one of 27 constituent maps in the 'Australia's Maritime Jurisdiction Map Series' produced by the Australian Ocean Data Network. The map incorporates bathymetric data from 2009 and land imagery from NASA's Blue Marble.

Use Cases

• Analyze the approved extended continental shelf boundaries for legal and policy research.
• Use the bathymetric background layer for oceanographic modeling and seafloor feature identification.
• Integrate the jurisdictional boundaries with other marine spatial planning datasets for conservation or resource management.

Strengths

• Part of a series of 27 detailed jurisdictional maps.
• Incorporates bathymetric data from a 2009 9 arc-second grid.

Limitations

• Data is provided only as a static A0-sized PDF map, limiting computational analysis.
• Excludes territories like Cocos Island and subantarctic regions, limiting geographic completeness.
• The underlying continental shelf approval data is from April 2008, which may not reflect recent developments.

Provenance

Source

Australian Ocean Data Network.

Collection Method

Derived from official maritime jurisdiction data and combined bathymetric/topographic grids.

Time Range

Continental shelf approval date is April 2008; bathymetric background is from 2009.

Freshness

Last updated on the platform in April 2026, but the core jurisdictional data is from 2008.

Geography

Maritime zones surrounding the Australian continent.