A review of mineral exploration trends, activities and discoveries in Australia in 2022.

The 2021 Offshore Greenhouse Gas Storage Acreage Release is a key strategy of the Australian Government to reduce emissions and support Australia's resource sector. The GHG acreage release will provide companies the opportunity to explore for offshore carbon dioxide injection and storage locations. The 2021 GHG acreage release consists of 5 areas across the Bonaparte, Browse and Northern Carnarvon Basins.

The 2023 Offshore Greenhouse Gas Storage Acreage Release is a key strategy of the Australian Government to reduce emissions and support Australia's resource sector. The GHG acreage release will provide companies the opportunity to explore for offshore carbon dioxide injection and storage locations. The 2023 GHG acreage release consists of 10 areas across the Bonaparte, Browse, Northern Carnarvon Basins, Perth, Otway, Bass and Gippsland Basins.

The annual offshore petroleum exploration acreage release is part of the government’s strategy to promote offshore oil and gas exploration. Each year, the government invites companies to bid for the opportunity to invest in oil and gas exploration in Australian waters. The areas shown have been nominated by petroleum industry stakeholders to be considered for the 2022 acreage release. Areas nominated for release will not receive endorsement from government until submissions resulting from a public consultation process can be considered. This publication does not indicate a commitment to a particular course of action.

Petroleum geochemical datasets and information are essential to government for evidence-based decision making on natural resources, and to the petroleum industry for de-risking exploration. Geoscience Australia’s newly built Data Discovery Portal (https://portal.ga.gov.au/) enables digital discoverability and accessibility to key petroleum geochemical datasets. The portal’s web map services and web feature services allow download and visualisation of geochemical data for source rocks and petroleum fluids, and deliver a petroleum systems framework for northern Australian basins. The Petroleum Source Rock Analytics Tool enables interrogation of source rock data within boreholes and field sites, and facilitates correlation of these elements of the petroleum system within and between basins. The Petroleum Systems Summary Assessment Tool assists the user to search and query components of the petroleum system(s) identified within a basin. The portal functionality includes customised data searches, and visualisation of data via interactive maps, graphs and geoscientific tools. Integration of the petroleum systems framework with the supporting geochemical data enables the Data Discovery Portal to unlock the value of these datasets by affording the user a one-stop access to interrogate the data. This allows greater efficiency and performance in evaluating the petroleum prospectivity of Australia’s sedimentary basins, facilitating and accelerating decision making around exploration investment to ensure Australia’s future resource wealth <b>Citation:</b> Edwards, D.S., MacFarlane, S.K., Grosjean, E., Buckler, T., Boreham, C.J., Henson, P., Cherukoori, R., Tracey-Patte, T., van der Wielen, S., Ray, J. and Raymond, O., 2020. Australian source rocks, fluids and petroleum systems – a new integrated geoscience data discovery portal for maximising data potential. In: Czarnota, K., Roach, I., Abbott, S., Haynes, M., Kositcin, N., Ray, A. and Slatter, E. (eds.) Exploring for the Future: Extended Abstracts, Geoscience Australia, Canberra, 1–4.

A review of mineral exploration trends, activities and discoveries in Australia in 2023.

The National Geochemical Survey of Australia (NGSA) is Australia’s first national-scale geochemical survey. It was delivered to the public on 30 June 2011, after almost five years of stakeholder engagement, strategic planning, sample collection, preparation and analysis, quality assurance/quality control, and preliminary data analytics. The project was comprehensively documented in seven initial open-file reports and six data and map sets, followed over the next decade by more than 70 well-cited scientific publications. This review compiles the body of work and knowledge that emanated from the project to-date as an indication of the impact the NGSA had over the decade 2011-2021. The geochemical fabric of Australia as never seen before has been revealed by the NGSA. This has spurred further research and stimulated the mineral exploration industry. This paper also critically looks at operational decisions taken at project time (2007-2011) that were good and perhaps – with the benefit of hindsight – not so good, with the intention of providing experiential advice for any future large-scale geochemical survey of Australia or elsewhere. Strengths of the NGSA included stakeholder engagement, holistic approach to a national survey, involvement of other geoscience agencies, collaboration on quality assurance with international partners, and targeted promotion of results. Weaknesses included gaining successful access to all parts of the nation, and management of sample processing in laboratories. <b>Citation:</b> Patrice de Caritat; The National Geochemical Survey of Australia: review and impact. <i>Geochemistry: Exploration, Environment, Analysis </i>2022;; 22 (4): geochem2022–032. doi: https://doi.org/10.1144/geochem2022-032 This article appears in multiple journals (Lyell Collection & GeoScienceWorld)

The annual offshore petroleum exploration acreage release is part of the government’s strategy to promote offshore oil and gas exploration. Each year, the government invites companies to bid for the opportunity to invest in oil and gas exploration in Australian waters. The 21 areas shown have been nominated by petroleum industry stakeholders to be considered for the 2021 acreage release. Areas nominated for release will not receive endorsement from government until submissions resulting from a public consultation process can be considered. This publication does not indicate a commitment to a particular course of action.

The 2023 Offshore Greenhouse Gas Storage Acreage Release is a key strategy of the Australian Government to reduce emissions and support Australia's resource sector. The GHG acreage release will provide companies the opportunity to explore for offshore carbon dioxide injection and storage locations. The 2023 GHG acreage release consists of 10 areas across the Bonaparte, Browse, Northern Carnarvon Basins, Perth, Otway, Bass and Gippsland Basins.

The annual offshore petroleum exploration acreage release is part of the government’s strategy to promote offshore oil and gas exploration. Each year, the government invites companies to bid for the opportunity to invest in oil and gas exploration in Australian waters. The 2021 acreage release consists of 21 areas offshore of Western Australia, Victoria, Tasmania and the Ashmore and Cartier Islands.