Overview

The carrying out of development may have significant impacts on the environment. 

State, Territory and Commonwealth legislation requires these impacts to be properly assessed before development is approved and, where significant impacts cannot be avoided, that they are properly monitored and appropriately mitigated.

How we can help

At Bick & Steele, we can help you understand your obligations under Commonwealth, State and Territory environmental legislation. We have assisted clients across the country, providing them crucial assistance on all environmental law matters. In particular, we can: 

• advise you on the environmental assessment and approval requirements for your development;

• assist you with environmental due diligence;

• assist you with approval compliance issues including responding to regulatory investigations;

• assist you with environmental audits to ensure you are meeting compliance obligations;

• advise you in relation to the importation, transportation and disposal of waste;

• draft or review contractual environmental liability clauses;

• review environmental assessment documentation to ensure that it is legally robust;

• where appropriate, retain technical experts under legal professional privilege to advise on the potential environmental effects of development;

• assist you to respond to pollution incidents including any associated regulatory investigation;

• advise and represent you in relation to criminal proceedings brought in relation to an environmental offence;

• provide training to managers and site personnel on critical environmental incident response procedures; and

• where required, represent you in Court.

Our experience

Examples of projects with respect to which our Directors have demonstrated their experience advising on these matters can be found here.