Recent amendments to the Environmental Protection Act 1994 (Qld)

By Emma McGrath.

Key Points:
Some confusing parts of the law will be clarified by the new amendments.

The Environmental Protection and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2007 was introduced to the Queensland Parliament on 23 August 2007. This article explores some of the proposed changes, and how these changes will work in practice.

Change in terminology for environmental management programs

The Bill proposes to change the existing terminology of "environmental management program" to "transitional environmental program". This addresses the potential confusion in regards to the terminology employed in the Act in relation to the similar wording of "environmental management plan" (which applies to mining), and in particular, the use of the acronym "EMP" for both instruments. There has been no other amendment other than the changing of the name of the document. This change is to be adopted throughout the Act.

No need to surrender registration certificate on sale of business

The Bill proposes to insert a new section into the Environmental Protection Act 1994 (Qld) which will provide that a registration certificate surrender application under section 73O of the Act is not required for a "continuing chapter 4 activity". This will be relevant in circumstances where a business has been transferred to a new operator, who has applied for a registration certificate for continuing chapter 4 activities under the Act. The original operator will no longer have to surrender their registration certificate as it will automatically expire when the new registration certificate is granted to the new operator.

Adding, changing or cancelling a development condition

The Bill proposes to insert a new subsection to enable the Environmental Protection Agency ("EPA") to add, amend or cancel a development condition where it is considered necessary or desirable because of the approval or amendment of a transitional environmental program. This clause will also insert a subsection to enable the EPA to change conditions with the consent of the holder of the development approval. This is intended to enable old approvals to be tidied up to remove obsolete conditions, amend conditions for clarification, or to insert conditions which assist the developer to comply with the development approval.

Environmental protection policies

Section 322 of the Act is proposed to be amended to clarify that a reference to an environmental protection policy also refers to a regulation, which was an omission in this section. In addition, Clause 17 purports to move the provision relating to the procedures for environmental management decisions and product labelling requirements from the environmental protection policies to the Environmental Protection Regulation 1998 (Qld).

Implications

The Bill effects minor technical, administrative and grammatical corrections to the Environmental Protection Act 1994 (Qld). It aims to reduce present uncertainty in several areas such as the need to surrender registration certificates for continuing chapter 4 activities and clarifying the use of the term "EMP".

For further information, please contact John Ware .