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  • This service contains the limit and extent of Section 3 of the Coastal Waters (State Powers) Act 1980, and the Coastal Waters (Northern Territories Powers) Act 1980. NOTE: the Polygon depicting the area of the coastal waters is not constrained on the landward side. The polygon includes areas that fall within the constitutional limits of the States. When information depicting the landward constitutional limit of the States becomes available, the polygon will be constrained.

  • Reports of bitumen stranding on the ocean beaches of southern Australia date back to the early days of European settlement. Previous investigations have shown that this ‘coastal bitumen’ comprises three categories of stranded petroleum: waxy bitumen, asphaltite and oil slicks. All three varieties are physically and chemically distinct from each other, and bear no geochemical resemblance to any indigenous Australian crude oil. This study focuses on the most common variety, waxy bitumen, which accounted for 90% of the strandings on six South Australian beaches repeatedly surveyed during 1991–1992. Geochemical analysis of 96 individual specimens collected from these survey sites and other beaches in South Australia and western Victoria has shown them to be variously weathered high-wax crude oils of paraffinic to aromatic-intermediate bulk composition. Elemental, isotopic and biomarker differences allow their assignment to at least five oil families with inferred source facies that range from deep freshwater lacustrine through paludal and deltaic to euxinic marine, possibly deposited within different sedimentary basins. Family 1, 2 and 3 waxy bitumens all contain biomarkers derived from the freshwater alga Botryococcus sp. and tropical angiosperms (notably dipterocarps). Similar biomarker assemblages are unknown in Australian sedimentary basins but are common in Cenozoic crude oils and source rocks throughout western Indonesia. Family 4 waxy bitumens lack these biomarkers, but do contain dinosterane and 24-n-propylcholestane, indicative of a marine source affinity, while the carbon isotopic signatures and high pristane/phytane (Pr/Ph) ratios of Family 5 waxy bitumens are consistent with their origin from coal-rich source rocks deposited in fluvial to deltaic sedimentary successions. The majority of these waxy bitumens represent an oceanic influx of non-indigenous, Southeast Asian crude oils carried into the waters of southern Australia by the Leeuwin Current. Although they are likely to originate from natural seepage within the Indonesian Archipelago, it is unknown whether the parent oils emanate from submarine seeps or from inland seepages which are then carried to the sea by rivers. The common practice of tanker cleaning operations in the Java and Banda seas may augment the supply of natural bitumen to the beaches of Australia.

  • Coastal environments are intrinsically dynamic and respond to a wide array of natural and anthropogenic drivers across a broad range of time steps. In addition, coastal environments are under increasing pressure from land use intensification and climate change. The development of the Australian Geoscience Data Cube has delivered an unprecedented capability to support environmental change monitoring applications through rapid processing and analysis of standardised Earth Observation (EO) time-series data in a High Performance Computing environment. Standardised long-term EO data records provide the capacity to monitor coastal changes processes and understand current changes from a historical perspective. The ability to visualise environmental changes in a spatio-temporal context provides the opportunity to assess whether the change phenomena are rapid / gradual onset, and/or episodic / cyclical in nature. Understanding the spatio-temporal nature of the changes also enables the attribution of observed changes to the potential causes. Hovmöller diagrams, typically used to plot meteorological data, can be applied for visualising large datasets in a meaningful way. In this study, we apply Hovmöller plots to examine coastal change processes and estuarine dynamics, based on a time-series of Landsat based surface reflectance data over a 27-year period (1987-2014), within the Australian Geoscience Data Cube. The Hovmöller plot in Figure 1 highlights the timing of a sea wall installation and associated land reclamation processes near Fremantle, Western Australia (see PDF attachment).Three coastal change processes are illustrated in this study: 1. The opening, closing and migration of the mouth of the Glenelg River in Victoria; the Hovmöller plots show that the river mouth moves on an episodic basis and remains closed for periods of time. 2. The installation of a sea wall and subsequent land reclamation near Fremantle in Western Australia; the results illustrate rapid anthropogenic change in the coastal zone and highlight the timing of the sea wall installation and land reclamation processes. 3. The migration of coastal dune fields north of Perth in Western Australia; the results show slow coastal change processes through the gradual northward migration of the dune field over multi-decadal time scales. The availability of standardised long-term Landsat data, in conjunction with new data becoming available from the Copernicus Sentinel-2 missions, point to the need for cross calibrated multi-sensor data, to enrich the global long-term EO record, in support of the detection and characterisation of coastal change phenomena. Presented at the 2016 Living Planet Symposium (LPS16) Prague, Czech Republic

  • This service contains the limit and extent of Section 3 of the Coastal Waters (State Powers) Act 1980, and the Coastal Waters (Northern Territories Powers) Act 1980. NOTE: the Polygon depicting the area of the coastal waters is not constrained on the landward side. The polygon includes areas that fall within the constitutional limits of the States. When information depicting the landward constitutional limit of the States becomes available, the polygon will be constrained.

  • This application provides a map view of the Coastal Waters (State/Territory Powers) Act 1980 - Australian Maritime Boundaries (2020) data, held within the Australian Marine Spatial Information System (AMSIS). The map shows a digital representation of the limits by which the waters adjacent to each of the Australian States and of the Northern Territory are determined under the Coastal Waters (State Powers) Act 1980, Coastal Waters (Northern Territory Powers) Act 1980.

  • This service contains the limit and extent of Section 3 of the Coastal Waters (State Powers) Act 1980, and the Coastal Waters (Northern Territories Powers) Act 1980. NOTE: the Polygon depicting the area of the coastal waters is not constrained on the landward side. The polygon includes areas that fall within the constitutional limits of the States. When information depicting the landward constitutional limit of the States becomes available, the polygon will be constrained.

  • Three maps have been created for RET to include in a Ministerial Briefing on changes to act relating to the area of opperation of NOPSEMA Relates to Advice Register Number 705 Not for public release. RET internal use only.

  • <div>Intertidal environments contain many important ecological habitats such as sandy beaches, tidal flats, rocky shores, and reefs. These environments also provide many valuable benefits such as storm surge protection, carbon storage, and natural resources.&nbsp;</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>Intertidal zones are being increasingly faced with threats including coastal erosion, land reclamation (e.g. port construction), and sea level rise. These regions are often highly dynamic, and accurate, up-to-date elevation data describing the changing topography and extent of these environments is needed. However, this data is expensive and challenging to map across the entire intertidal zone of a continent the size of Australia. &nbsp;</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>The intertidal zone also forms a critical habitat and foraging ground for migratory shore birds and other species. An improved characterisation of the exposure patterns of these dynamic environments is important to support conservation efforts and to gain a better understanding of migratory species pathways. &nbsp;</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>The <strong>DEA Intertidal </strong>product suite (https://knowledge.dea.ga.gov.au/data/product/dea-intertidal) provides annual continental -scale elevation and exposure products for Australia’s intertidal zone, mapped at a 10m resolution, from Digital Earth Australia’s archive of open-source Landsat and Sentinel-2 satellite data. These intertidal products enable users to better monitor and understand some of the most dynamic regions of Australia’s coastlines.</div><div><br></div><div><strong>Applications</strong></div><div><br></div><div> - Integration with existing topographic and bathymetric data to seamlessly map the elevation of the coastal zone.&nbsp;</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div> - Providing baseline elevation data for predicting the impact of coastal hazards such as storm surges, tsunami inundation, or future sea-level rise.&nbsp;</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div> - Investigating coastal erosion and sediment transport processes.&nbsp;</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div> - Supporting habitat mapping and modelling for coastal ecosystems extending across the terrestrial to marine boundary.&nbsp;</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div> - Characterisation of the spatio-temporal exposure patterns of the intertidal zone to support migratory species studies and applications.&nbsp;</div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div>