Natural Resources Insurance
Perth, Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane & Canberra

A natural resources business may explore, extract, process, store or transport material, and those stages should be described separately. Explain the resource involved, the project’s maturity and the activities controlled by your entity. Include work conducted through joint ventures, contractors or operating subsidiaries. Where a project is not yet producing revenue, distinguish exploration assets and field equipment from planned production infrastructure. Tell the broker about temporary camps, remote storage and work on land owned or managed by others. This detail helps frame the discussion around an actual operation rather than an umbrella industry term.

Consider what surrounds the work as well as what sits inside the project boundary. Access roads, water supplies, neighbouring land uses and third-party infrastructure may influence the consequences of an incident. Describe activities that could affect land or water, along with the relevant management arrangements and known site history. Ask how the insurance proposal distinguishes sudden events, historical conditions, ongoing operations and rehabilitation responsibilities. A general reference to environmental or public liability cover should not be read as an answer to every issue. The wording, insured entity, location and particular facts all need to be considered together.

Compile the agreements that establish who controls the project and who bears particular costs. These may include joint-venture documents, land-access arrangements, service contracts, equipment hire and supply agreements. Show the broker material variations and schedules, not just the front page. Identify obligations concerning third-party property, clean-up, reinstatement and insurance maintained by other participants. When more than one entity has an interest in the same assets, prepare a simple ownership schedule. Ask whether the requested insurance structure reflects those interests, and obtain legal advice where the meaning of an indemnity or project agreement needs to be established.

An asset and activity register should follow the changing project. Record mobile equipment, survey systems, samples, temporary structures and other material assets, including locations where they are stored between campaigns. Keep relevant approvals, environmental assessments, maintenance information and incident records available for an accurate submission. For a project moving towards production, identify which assumptions remain provisional and which contracts have been signed. Insurers may ask for technical reports; provide current documents and explain their scope. Avoid presenting an early study as a final operational specification if the project design has subsequently changed.

If an incident affects the project, document the activity underway, the parties on site and the assets or areas involved. Preserve location information, field notes, photographs and contractor instructions when safe and appropriate. Use qualified advisers for technical or environmental assessment and check the relevant insurance reporting arrangements. Keep the chronology of immediate protective actions separate from later repair or remediation proposals. This makes it easier to explain what was done urgently and what still requires approval. Do not assume that expenditure under a land-access agreement will necessarily fall within an insurance policy simply because it follows the same event.

Renewal is an opportunity to check whether the project description still matches the business. New drilling methods, an additional licence area, an acquisition or a change of operator should be raised explicitly. Review how equipment would be retrieved or replaced if access became restricted, and how essential project records would remain available. Ask the broker about the implications of moving from exploration to construction or operation before that transition occurs. Discuss realistic limits, financial exposures and interruption assumptions for the current stage. The resulting insurance review should acknowledge uncertainties in the project rather than convert forecasts into assurances about future coverage.