The Change in One Paragraph
From 9 June 2026, three environmental approvals that Western Australian mining and petroleum proponents previously lodged through the Department's legacy systems must now be lodged through the Resources Online portal. These three approvals are Native Vegetation Clearing Permits (NVCPs) for mineral and petroleum activities, petroleum Environment Plans (EPs), and Oil Spill Contingency Plans (OSCPs). The legacy Environmental Assessment and Regulatory System (EARS) has been retired for these submissions. This is Release 3 of Resources Online, the final rollout that completes the migration of core mining and petroleum environmental lodgements off EARS and onto a single consolidated portal.
This article sets out what has changed, what has not, and the practical considerations for tenement holders moving their first applications through the new system.
Some Context First: What Each Acronym Actually Means
If you are not lodging environmental approvals every week, the alphabet soup is worth pausing on.
- DMPE, the Department of Mines, Petroleum and Exploration. The Western Australian government department that regulates the resources sector. These functions previously sat within DEMIRS (Department of Energy, Mines, Industry Regulation and Safety). DEMIRS was dissolved on 30 June 2025 in a public-sector reform and DMPE, the new Western Australian department responsible for mining, petroleum and exploration regulation, commenced on 1 July 2025.
- EARS, the Environmental Assessment and Regulatory System. The Department's older online lodgement platform. EARS handled environmental submissions for the resources sector for more than a decade.
- Resources Online. The new digital lodgement portal that replaces EARS. It is the single point of online interaction with DMPE for the approvals and notifications now in scope.
- NVCP, Native Vegetation Clearing Permit (mineral and petroleum activities). The authorisation required to clear native vegetation for an exploration or mining activity, granted under the Western Australian environmental regulatory framework.
- EP, Environment Plan. The detailed environmental management document a petroleum operator must have accepted before commencing a petroleum activity. The EP describes the activity, the environmental risks and the controls.
- OSCP, Oil Spill Contingency Plan. The plan describing how a petroleum operator will respond to a hydrocarbon spill, required as part of, or in support of, an EP.
- PoW, Programme of Work. The exploration activity approval covering ground-disturbing work on a tenement.
- MDCP, Mining Development and Closure Proposal (formerly known as a Mining Proposal). The whole-of-life document required before mining operations commence.
- MCP, Mine Closure Plan. The document describing how a mine will be closed, rehabilitated and relinquished.
What Moved on 9 June 2026, and What Was Already on Resources Online
The 9 June 2026 release added the final three environmental approvals to Resources Online.
| Approval | Lodgement System Before 9 June 2026 | Lodgement System From 9 June 2026 |
|---|---|---|
| Native Vegetation Clearing Permit (mineral and petroleum activities) | DMPE Departmental Submissions portal | Resources Online |
| Environment Plan (petroleum) | EARS Online | Resources Online |
| Oil Spill Contingency Plan | EARS Online | Resources Online |
Programmes of Work, Mining Development and Closure Proposals, Mine Closure Plans, Eligible Mining Activity Notices and rehabilitation reporting were already migrated in earlier Resources Online releases. Mineral and petroleum tenement administration, meaning applications, dealings and transfers, sits on a separate Department system and is not part of this migration.
For practical purposes, a Western Australian tenement holder now lodges almost the entire environmental and operational approval suite through one portal instead of three.
The Blackout Window
DMPE warned the industry that no online submissions for EPs, OSCPs or NVCPs were possible from 5 June through 8 June 2026 while the migration completed. Any application a proponent intended to lodge in that period had to be either lodged by 4 June (in the legacy system) or held until 9 June (in Resources Online).
The Department's published guidance addressed the lodgement cutover but did not set out a transitional pathway for applications that were partially drafted in the legacy systems at the cutover date. Proponents with in-progress drafts at 4 June should confirm directly with DMPE through resourcesonline@dmpe.wa.gov.au how those drafts are to be carried into the new portal before the next submission window.
That four-day blackout is now behind us, but it sets the precedent for how DMPE manages future Resources Online releases. Proponents with time-critical lodgements should build a buffer around any future migration date the Department announces.
What Changes in the New Lodgement Workflow
The Resources Online portal differs from EARS in five practical ways.
1. Single Sign-On Across Approvals
A proponent's account now ties together environmental and activity approvals lodged through Resources Online: PoWs, MCPs, MDCPs, NVCPs, EPs and OSCPs. Previously these sat across two or three systems. Tenement administration is not part of this consolidation and continues to sit on a separate Department system.
2. Stricter Document Standards
Resources Online enforces consistent file formats and structured submission fields at upload. PDFs without searchable text, oversized attachments, and incomplete cover sheets that EARS sometimes accepted will be rejected by Resources Online before the file reaches an assessor.
3. Improved Status Visibility
Proponents see assessment status, regulator queries and information requests in one place rather than via email correspondence.
4. Formalised Communications
Regulator-to-proponent queries flow through the portal's messaging function. The Department has signalled a preference for portal queries over ad hoc email.
5. Public Search as Architecture
Accepted MCPs lodged through Resources Online are publicly available through the Resources Online public search. Whether that transparency layer extends to other approvals will depend on how the Department develops the platform.
DMPE has reported that Mining Development and Closure Proposals are currently being assessed in an average of around 26 business days under the Resources Online framework, against a target of 30 business days and an earlier published average of around 58 business days under the predecessor Mining Proposal framework. That figure should be read with appropriate caution. It reflects MDCPs assessed at the front end of the new platform, which tend to be the well-prepared submissions where the proponent has invested in fitting the new format. The averages may change as a wider cross-section of the industry transitions and as DMPE applies the framework across larger or more complex proposals.
The statutory obligations have not changed. The lodgement and management interface has. Resources Online enforces things EARS would let through, and that is where avoidable rejections will accumulate.
What the Sector Has Been Telling the Regulator
Resources Online has not been a quiet rollout. The transition has been the subject of sustained industry feedback through the lead-up to Release 3, including at the AMEC WA Regulatory Forum on 12 May 2025, where DMPE, the Environmental Protection Authority and the Commonwealth's environment department (DCCEEW) addressed an audience of industry stakeholders. The consistent themes from sector participants have been unclear workflows, inconsistencies in data handling, insufficient departmental support, and the absence of transitional support for smaller proponents who lack the in-house resources of the majors. These observations were captured in industry commentary including a Datamine regulatory-reform essay published in the same month.
It is worth taking that feedback seriously when planning a lodgement. A portal change is rarely as simple as a new login, and the proponents most exposed are those without the staffing depth to absorb a process change while a lodgement is in flight.
What We Would Check Before the Next Lodgement
From a Sceptre Strategic advisory standpoint, three checks are worth doing in advance of any NVCP, EP or OSCP submission through Resources Online.
Document Standards
The new portal is stricter on file format and structured submission fields than EARS. Confirm with your environmental consultants and document controllers that the next submission meets the current Resources Online requirements before the file is uploaded. Fixing a format issue at the drafting stage is far less disruptive than discovering it through a rejected lodgement.
EP and OSCP as a Paired Review
Environment Plans and Oil Spill Contingency Plans are tightly coupled in the new workflow. Review them together rather than sequentially, confirm the cross-references between them, and lodge them with their linkage clearly evidenced.
Account Access and Authority
Resources Online access is not automatically migrated from EARS for every former user. Confirm now that at least two people in your team, a primary lodger and a backup, hold verified Resources Online access at the level required for your submission type. Sorting access on lodgement day is the single most avoidable cause of a missed deadline.
What This Does and Does Not Change About the Underlying Obligation
The statutory obligations under the relevant approval regimes have not changed. The substance of an NVCP application, an EP or an OSCP — what must be assessed, what must be controlled, what must be reported — is the same as it was on 8 June 2026.
What has changed is the lodgement and management interface. The Department's expectations of document quality, of submission completeness and of proponent responsiveness are higher in the new system. The portal applies checks at upload that EARS did not.
A proponent who had a robust environmental approvals process before 9 June will have a smoother transition than one who relied on EARS's tolerance to compensate for thin internal preparation.
What Proponents Should Do This Quarter
If you have a current or upcoming lodgement of an NVCP, EP or OSCP and have not yet moved to Resources Online, we would suggest the following.
Pre-Lodgement Readiness Checklist
- Confirm Resources Online access for at least two staff members per organisation, the primary lodger and a backup.
- Calendar any time-sensitive lodgements with a four-week buffer in case the first attempt requires re-lodgement. Build the buffer in once; you will not need it on the second submission.
- Note your point-of-contact for Resources Online enquiries, resourcesonline@dmpe.wa.gov.au, and add it to your environmental approvals contact list.
Closing
Resources Online is going to shape how Western Australian mining and petroleum proponents interact with their regulator for the next decade. The proponents who get an early run at it, who confirm their account access, audit their document standards, and reconcile their EP and OSCP linkages before the next lodgement is on the clock, will spend less time on rejected submissions and more time on the substance of their environmental management. The cost of treating Resources Online as a simple URL change is a rejection on a time-critical lodgement, and that is a discovery best avoided.
Where Sceptre Strategic Can Help
The Practice's role on a Resources Online lodgement starts well before the application is drafted and continues through to post-acceptance close-out. Our environmental approvals and lodgement support for WA mining and petroleum proponents includes:
- Pre-lodgement document audits against current Resources Online file format and structured submission requirements
- Environment Plan and Oil Spill Contingency Plan linked-document reviews for petroleum proponents
- Post-acceptance close-out, conditions calendaring and reporting-obligation scheduling
- Retained compliance officer arrangements for proponents without an in-house environmental function
Travis Sickerdick, our principal, has more than 20 years of operational mining experience across Western Australia and other Australian jurisdictions, gained on-site across exploration, open-pit and underground operations, and processing plant build and commissioning. His direct involvement spans environmental approvals, compliance management and regulatory negotiation. We operate nationally.