Talk to us before submitting an application so we can help determine which application type you should use, and what fees or costs would apply.

This Schedule is issued under section 21(1) of the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act 1996.

Talk to us before submitting an application so we can help determine which application type you should use, and what fees or costs would apply. 

 These Schedules are issued under section 21(1) of the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act 1996.

We recover all actual and reasonable costs from the applicant when we administer proposals of national significance.

This includes any costs for providing secretarial and support services to a board of inquiry, and for making recommendations to the Minister for the Environment on applications.

We also recover costs for providing advice to potential applicants prior to a proposal being lodged with us, even if it is not subsequently lodged with the us.

To find out more about our policies, and about who and what is charged, you can read our factsheet and cost recovery policy.

Cost recovery policy for proposals of national significance (pdf 350KB)

Charge-out rates for EPA staff

How much will the Nationally Significant Proposal process cost? - factsheet (pdf 255KB)

We recover all actual reasonable costs from an applicant or requiring authority under the COVID-19 Recovery (Fast-track Consenting) Act.

The Minister for the Environment has delegated to the EPA, his functions, powers and duties related to the recovery of costs, as set out in clause 14 of Schedule 5, to the Act. 

Cost Recovery policy for COVID-19 Fast-track Consenting (pdf, 630 KB)

Find out about Fast-track Consenting 

Some of the work we do to implement the Imports and Exports (Restrictions) Act 1988 is paid for by parties using these services:

The principles we use to set our prices

We use six pricing principles to set the fees and charges that were agreed by the Government in August 2003. The principles state that prices should:

• reflect actual costs
• not discourage applicants
• ensure predictability
• recognise public benefits
• enable us to anticipate planned legislative change
• not be a barrier to growth and innovation.

We aim to strike a balance between the first principle – the cost to process applications – and the remaining five that focus on encouraging and supporting the application process.

Application fees vary depending on the complexity of the application, processing time, and whether it's publicly notified or not. If fees change you will be charged the fee that applied at the time you submitted your application.

Why some fees are negotiated

Most of our applications have fixed fees. But for some applications the fee is listed as “negotiated”. These are mostly unique applications where there have been too few instances of that application type to establish a history of costs. The fee is determined on an individual basis, after consultation with you and prior to your application being processed.

The best way to determine what your application fee will be is to talk to us as early as possible, before you start preparing your application.

Disbursement charges

Some applications have a fixed fee plus disbursements. These are usually applications that are publicly notified and the disbursements can include costs incurred to notify the application. This may be an advertisement in the four main national newspapers.

The disbursements associated with a negotiated fee are also for advertising the application but may also include some of the costs for a public hearing (if one is needed). Any costs incurred from engaging consultants and external experts to provide further information will be on-charged to you as they are charged to us. We will provide an estimate of disbursement costs before you submit your application.

Further information requests

As far as possible, we will identify all the information you need to provide in your application before it is formally accepted. But occasionally we need to request further information after receiving your application. We can only do this within the first 10 working days after it has been formally accepted.

If you are unable or unwilling to provide the requested information, we may charge you the additional costs incurred to seek the information ourselves. The cost of securing the information will be charged at the standard hourly rate. You can ask for an estimate of the additional costs you are likely to be charged.