Australian Maritime Boundaries 2020: Territorial Limits and Offshore Zones

Australia's maritime jurisdiction, including external territories, is represented in this geospatial dataset. Geoscience Australia developed the data, which delineates territorial baselines, treaty boundaries, and offshore petroleum zones under Australian law. The data is current to December 2020 and uses the GDA94 geographic datum.

Use Cases

• Mapping territorial sea and exclusive economic zone limits based on the legal descriptions in the Seas and Submerged Lands Act 1973.
• Analyzing offshore petroleum and greenhouse gas storage areas as defined under the Offshore Petroleum and Greenhouse Gas Storage Act 2006.
• Visualizing maritime boundaries established by treaties between Australia and neighbouring countries.
• Determining state and Northern Territory coastal waters under the Coastal Waters (State/Territory Powers) Act 1980.

Strengths

• Data is published by the authoritative national agency, Geoscience Australia, in consultation with other Commonwealth departments.
• Explicitly replaces the previous version (Australian Maritime Boundaries 2014a), indicating version control.
• Coverage is defined as the whole Australian marine jurisdiction, approximately between 7°S to 70°S and 40°E to 175°E.

Limitations

• The description notes that in the event of inconsistency, the legal limits under legislation prevail over the digital data.
• Row count and specific column-level documentation are unknown, requiring inspection after download.
• The data reflects the coastline based on source material available at the time of production, which may be outdated.

Provenance

Source

Geoscience Australia, developed in consultation with the Attorney-General's Department, Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, and the Australian Hydrographic Office.

Collection Method

Digital representation of legally established maritime limits and boundaries.

Time Range

Currency date is December 2020.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-06-05 07:56:37.585136; data currency is December 2020.

Geography

Australian marine jurisdiction, including the mainland, offshore islands, and external territories.