Australian Maritime Boundaries 2020: Territorial Baselines and Jurisdictional Limits

August 2019 data delineates Australia's maritime zones, including territorial baselines and international treaty boundaries. Geoscience Australia developed this digital representation of limits established under the Seas and Submerged Lands Act 1973. Coverage spans from 7°S to 70°S latitude and 40°E to 175°E longitude, including external territories.

Use Cases

• Map offshore petroleum and greenhouse gas storage areas based on the limits referenced from the OPGGSA.
• Analyze maritime jurisdiction for legal or diplomatic purposes based on treaty boundaries and territorial sea baselines.
• Visualize coastal state powers and adjacent water limits for state and Northern Territory waters.
• Integrate maritime zone data into GIS for marine spatial planning and environmental management.

Strengths

• Official data product from Geoscience Australia, developed in consultation with Commonwealth agencies like the Attorney-General's Department.
• Updated to reflect the 2018 Timor Sea Treaty, indicating currency on specific international agreements.
• Provides coverage for Australia's entire marine jurisdiction, including external territories.
• Coordinates are supplied in the GDA94 datum, which is functionally equivalent to WGS84 for interoperability.

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.
• In the event of inconsistency, the legal limits under legislation prevail over the digital data.

Provenance

Source

Geoscience Australia, in consultation with other Commonwealth Government agencies.

Collection Method

Delineation of legal maritime limits and boundaries, with data published as a GIS product.

Time Range

Currency August 2019.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-06-16 18:38:44.680888; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Australia's marine jurisdiction, including mainland, offshore islands, and external territories, approximately 7°S to 70°S and 40°E to 175°E.