Report a petroleum operations incident

Under the Petroleum Regulations 2020, you must report any serious and reportable incidents that occur on your petroleum interest to the minister.

You must retain all incident records and reports for at least 5 years after the incident occurred.

You may be prosecuted for failing to comply with incident reporting and recordkeeping obligations.

Serious incidents

A serious incident is an incident arising from activities conducted under a permit or licence as a result of which any of the following occur:

• a person suffers serious injury or illness or is killed
• an uncontrolled fire or explosion occurs
• an uncontrolled flow of formation fluids or well fluids into the environment or into a separate underground formation occurs
• there is a failure of, or damage to barriers, infrastructure or systems that leads to or could lead to a loss of integrity in a well or petroleum surface infrastructure that requires emergency intervention
• a blowout preventer, pressure control equipment or emergency shutdown system is activated
• both primary and secondary well barriers are no longer intact
• the security of national gas supply is prejudices or an imminent risk to the security of natural gas supply arises.

How to report

You must:

• call 1300 935 250 within 2 hours of the incident happening
• email a written notification to DITTPetroleumOperations@nt.gov.au within 24 hours.

If the serious incident results from a failure of the integrity of a well or surface infrastructure, you must provide a written investigation report, including all related documents, within one month after the incident occurred.

Reportable incidents

A reportable incident is an incident arising from activities conducted under a permit or licence as a result of which any of the following occur:

• immediate action is required to prevent a serious incident
• a single barrier or control remains intact so as to prevent loss of integrity in a well or petroleum surface infrastructure and no other barrier or control exists
• equipment or systems that are designed to reduce the consequences of a serious incident fail or are compromised
• a designed operating envelope is exceeded.

How to report

Fill in an incident notification form and email it to DITTPetroleumOperations@nt.gov.au within 72 hours.

You must use the approved form and include all the information set out in the Petroleum Regulations 2020.

Other incident reporting

You may be required to report the same incident to another agency under NT legislation.

Reportable and recordable incidents under the Petroleum (Environment) Regulations 2016 must be reported to the Department of Environment, Parks and Water Security (DEPWS).

To find out more, visit the DEPWS  website.

Serious injuries, dangerous incidents or a death at a workplace must also be notified to NT WorkSafe under the Work Health and Safety (National Uniform Legislation) Act 2011.

For more information, contact NT WorkSafe on 1800 019 115 or visit the NT WorkSafe website.