AMB2020: Australian Maritime Boundaries for Offshore Petroleum and Greenhouse Gas Storage

Geoscience Australia's AMB2020 dataset is a digital representation of Australia's maritime zones and scheduled areas defined under the Offshore Petroleum and Greenhouse Gas Storage Act 2006. The data covers the entire Australian marine jurisdiction, including external territories, with geographical extents from approximately 8°S to 70°S latitude and 39°E to 174°E longitude. It was updated in August 2019 to incorporate the 2018 Timor Sea Treaty and is published in ESRI Geodatabase and web service formats.

Use Cases

• Mapping offshore petroleum exploration zones based on legislated maritime boundaries.
• Analyzing jurisdictional overlaps for greenhouse gas storage projects based on the scheduled areas.
• Visualizing Australia's maritime limits for legal and treaty compliance assessments.
• Integrating maritime boundary data with other marine spatial planning layers for environmental impact studies.

Strengths

• Data is officially produced by Geoscience Australia in consultation with key government agencies like the Attorney-General's Department.
• Explicit geographical coverage defined as approximately 8°S to 70°S and 39°E to 174°E, encompassing mainland and external territories.
• Updated to reflect specific international agreements, such as the 2018 Timor Sea Treaty.

Limitations

• Description metadata is limited; actual data quality requires manual inspection after download.
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.

Provenance

Source

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

Collection Method

Official delineation of maritime limits and boundaries under Australian legislation.

Time Range

Currency August 2019.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-04-10 22:06:50.148512; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Australia's marine jurisdiction, including waters adjacent to the mainland, offshore islands, and External Territories.