8Meaning of baseline period

8  Meaning of baseline period

Baseline period—general rule

 (1) For this determination, and subject to section 26 (which deals with transferring project areas), the baseline period for a particular area of land is:

 (a) for an area of land that is wholly within the high rainfall zone—the period of 10 calendar years; and

 (b) for an area of land that is wholly within the low rainfall zone—the period of 15 calendar years;

  that ends immediately before:

 (c) for an area of land that is part of a project area that was identified in the section 27 declaration when the project was declared an eligible offsets project—the calendar year in which the crediting period of the project begins; and

 (d) for an area of land that is part of a project area that was identified in the section 27 declaration at a later date—the calendar year in which the relevant variation of the section 27 declaration took effect.

Note 1: If a project area has a single project area part (that is, if the project area lies entirely within a single rainfall zone), it has a single baseline period. If a project area has two project area parts (that is, if the project area spans both rainfall zones), the project area does not have a single baseline period. Instead, each project area part has its own baseline period.

Note 2: For transferring project areas, the former determination generally fixed a baseline period. Section 26 preserves the baseline period that applied under the former determination.

Baseline period—subdivided project areas

 (2) The baseline period of an area of land in a subdivided project area is the same as the baseline period of the area of land in the original project area.

Note: See subsection 15(2) for the meaning of ‘subdivided project area’ and ‘original project area’.