1. What this tool is
Fed-Tas Enviro Law is a specialist research assistant for Tasmanian and Federal environmental compliance. It retrieves passages directly from a curated corpus of more than twenty current Acts, regulations, codes, statutory policies, and authoritative guidance documents, and uses an AI language model to synthesise a cited answer — it does not search the open web or draw on general knowledge outside its indexed corpus.
It is designed for professionals: environmental consultants, planners, project managers, heritage practitioners, and lawyers working on projects with Tasmanian or Federal EPBC regulatory obligations.
2. What this tool covers — and what it does not
This tool is built specifically for Tasmanian and Federal environmental law. It covers the EPBC Act 1999, EMPCA 1994, LUPAA 1993, the Forest Practices Act and Code, the Water Management Act 1999, threatened species legislation (state and federal), nature conservation, Aboriginal heritage under the Aboriginal Heritage Act 1975 (TAS), and historic cultural heritage — along with EPA Tasmania guidance documents.
It expressly does not cover the following areas. If your question falls into one of these, the assistant will say so and point you to the right authority:
- Climate change, emissions, and carbon — the Climate Change Act 2022, NGER Act, safeguard mechanism, ACCUs, or renewable energy certificates. Contact the Clean Energy Regulator.
- Marine farming and aquaculture — the Living Marine Resources Management Act 1995 or Marine Farming Planning Act 1995. Contact NRE Tasmania.
- Mining and mineral resources — the Mineral Resources Development Act 1995. Contact Mineral Resources Tasmania.
- Native title — the Native Title Act 1993 or traditional owner rights. Contact the National Native Title Tribunal. Note: Aboriginal heritage protections under the Aboriginal Heritage Act 1975 (TAS) are covered by this tool.
- Dangerous goods and transport — the Dangerous Goods (Road and Rail Transport) Act 2010. Contact WorkSafe Tasmania.
- Other Australian states — SA, VIC, NSW, QLD, WA, or NT law.
- Individual council planning schemes — the LUPAA framework is covered; individual Local Provisions Schedules for each council are not. Contact the relevant council or the Tasmanian Planning Commission.
3. Not legal advice
This tool provides cited research assistance — it can identify obligations, flag risks, and explain what legislation requires in practice. It is not a substitute for formal legal advice or regulatory sign-off. For decisions with significant financial, environmental, or legal consequences, always consult a qualified environmental lawyer or contact EPA Tasmania or the relevant authority directly.
If a question falls outside the scope of Tasmanian and Federal environmental law, the assistant will say so rather than speculate or provide a general answer.
4. The knowledge base
The assistant is indexed on more than twenty current sources spanning Tasmanian and Federal environmental law. These include: the EPBC Act 1999 (Cth) and the EPBC Significant Impact Guidelines 1.1 and 1.2; the Commonwealth Environment Protection Reform Act 2025; the Tasmanian Regional Forest Agreement; Tasmanian primary legislation (EMPCA 1994, LUPAA 1993, Forest Practices Act 1985, Water Management Act 1999, TSP Act 1995, Nature Conservation Act 2002, National Parks & Reserves Act 2002, Aboriginal Heritage Act 1975, Historic Cultural Heritage Act 1995); the Forest Practices Code 2020 and EMPCA Waste Management Regulations 2020; statutory policies (Water Quality Policy 1997, EPP Noise 2009, EPP Air Quality 2004); EPA Tasmania guidance (EIS Guidelines 2023, EIA Board Guide 2019); Approved Conservation Advices for the Swift Parrot and Tasmanian Devil; and a curated set of EPBC case-law headnotes. The full list is always visible in the Knowledge Base panel on the right of the screen.
The knowledge base was last updated in May 2026. The EPBC Act content reflects Compilation No. 68, current to March 2026. Very recent amendments may not yet be incorporated — always verify against the official source before acting on any answer.
Each answer shows a source pill below the response — for example, EPBC Act 1999 · Mar 2026. This shows which Act was cited and how current the indexed version is. Use these to identify the source and assess its currency before relying on it.
Where retrieved content is older than about eighteen months, answers may include a currency caveat advising you to verify whether amendments have been made since that date. This is a deliberate guardrail — the system flags age rather than silently asserting old content as current. Acts indexed more recently won't trigger it.
5. Asking questions
Type your question in plain English — no legal shorthand is required. The more context you provide, the more targeted the answer. Include the activity type (such as road construction, revegetation, or controlled burn), the project location or catchment, the scale of works, and any relevant species or habitat types if you know them.
You can ask follow-up questions — the assistant retains context from the conversation above and builds on previous answers. The Explore Further chips that appear after each response suggest related directions worth investigating, and clicking one will populate the question box without automatically submitting it.
You can download any answer as a PDF, Markdown file, or plain text file using the buttons that appear below each response. This is useful for maintaining project records, building audit trails, or sharing findings with colleagues.
6. Practitioner View
For each question you choose Cited answer, Practitioner view, or both. The Cited answer states strictly what the source material says — heavily caveated, flagging every gap — and doesn't interpret. The Practitioner view takes the same cited sources and applies them to your situation: what the obligations mean in practice, what a regulator is likely to look for during assessment, and where the key risks and grey areas lie.
Both use exactly the same retrieved sources — no additional search is performed — and the Practitioner view is fully cited too; the difference is that it interprets and advises where the Cited answer only states. Each scales to the question: a quick factual lookup gets a short read, a real scenario a fuller one.
7. Analysing documents
When you open the tool, you have two starting points. You can type a question directly — in which case the assistant searches the indexed legislation and returns a cited answer. Or you can attach a document (an Environmental Management Plan, EIS, permit application, management plan, or similar), which opens a second set of options tailored to that document.
Use the paperclip icon on the landing screen, or the + button in the chat area, to attach a file. Supported formats are PDF, Word (.docx), HTML, and plain text. Only the text content is read — images, charts, and diagrams are not processed.
When a document is attached, a Quick Read runs automatically. This classifies the document type, generates a short summary, and produces a set of suggested questions relevant to what the document contains. You then have three options:
1. Ask your own question — type anything in the question box. The assistant will answer using both the document and the legislation together — so you can ask "does this EMP address discharge obligations?" and get a response grounded in both.
2. Use a suggested question — click any of the chips generated by the Quick Read to populate the question box, then send.
3. Run a Ready-Made Analysis (RMA) — the panel shows the available Ready-Made Analysis types. Gap Analysis is the first of these; more types are in development and will appear here as they become available.
Gap Analysis reviews your document against Tasmanian and Federal legislative requirements across up to fourteen compliance categories — water management, biodiversity and threatened species, cultural and Aboriginal heritage, vegetation clearing, waste, air quality, noise, erosion and sediment control, construction and operational EM, stakeholder consultation, monitoring and reporting, mitigation hierarchy, and EMP currency. The result is a structured table showing each category as PRESENT, PARTIAL, or ABSENT, followed by a narrative summary of key risks and recommended next steps. Documents are read up to 20,000 words; for longer documents, upload individual appendices or chapters. Lead with the most critical content.
Note on running Gap Analysis with a question typed. Gap Analysis reads the uploaded document only — your typed question won't be included. If you've typed a question in the box and click the Gap Analysis button, the tool will confirm this before proceeding. Send the question as a normal query afterwards if you also want a focused answer on top of the analysis.
Some processes — particularly Ready-Made Analysis tools — can take a minute or two to complete. A progress indicator will show while the system is working. Please be patient and do not close or reload the page. Gap Analysis identifies structural coverage only — it does not assess the depth or quality of what is written, and it does not constitute a compliance certification. Findings should always be verified with EPA Tasmania or a qualified environmental consultant before acting.
Once a document is attached, it remains active for the rest of your session. All follow-up questions will be answered in the context of that document. A banner at the bottom of the screen confirms which document is active, and you can remove it at any time using the ✕ remove button.
8. Saved history (opt-in)
Signed-in accounts can save your work — conversations, Ready-Made Analyses and readability checks — so you can return to them later. Saving is off by default. You turn it on with the tick at sign-up, or any time via Account → Save my history.
While history is on there's nothing to click: your conversations are saved automatically as you work (titled from your first question) and appear in the THREADS sidebar section; your gap analyses, condition-compliance checks, quick washes and readability checks are saved automatically too. The source documents you upload are not stored — only the result.
Click a thread to reopen it (follow-ups auto-append, with context from the earlier answers). Click the ⋮ icon to rename, branch (duplicate to take it a new direction) or delete. ⤢ Open full history opens the searchable History & Library — all your conversations and analyses in one place.
If history is off, the save row under an answer reads "History is off — turn on to save" and one click takes you to the toggle. Everything you save is kept until you delete it: remove a single item from its ⋮ menu, or delete all your data from your account. A thread older than 60 days shows a small banner noting that sources may have changed since.
9. How pricing works
helpp.site uses a credit model, not a subscription. Different actions cost different amounts of credits — asking a standard question is cheaper than running a full document gap analysis. The current per-action prices are listed in the Pricing modal in the left sidebar.
Every new account gets 100 free credits on sign-up. When you've used those up, you can top up by buying a credit pack — three sizes (Starter / Standard / Pro) with bonus credits on the bigger packs. Pack prices are shown in the Pricing modal in US dollars; your local equivalent appears at checkout. Credits purchased in a pack don't expire for 24 months.
If an action fails (the language model errors out, or the request times out), the credits you paid for it are automatically returned to your wallet. You only pay for what completes successfully.
Anonymous users can ask a small number of questions per session without signing in — no credits required for that — but document analysis and saved threads need an account.
10. Glossary & Acronyms
The Glossary & Acronyms button in the left sidebar opens a searchable reference of the terminology used across Tasmanian and Federal environmental law. It covers statutory acronyms (EPBC, EMPCA, LUPAA, NEPA), agency and authority names (EPA Tasmania, TPC, DCCEEW), document types (EMP, EIS, DPEMP, RAA), and plain-English concept terms (controlled action, significant impact, Matters of National Environmental Significance). Each entry shows the full name, jurisdiction (Tasmanian, Commonwealth, or both), and a short note on what it is and where it sits in the regulatory framework.
Use the search bar at the top of the modal to filter by acronym or by any word in the full name or notes. The glossary is also used internally to disambiguate jurisdictional questions — for example, recognising that "EP Act" can mean either the Tasmanian or Commonwealth Act depending on context.
11. Your account and signing in
The top bar has an Account section. When you're signed out it shows a single Sign in button; when you're signed in it shows your display name with your email address as a subtitle. Click it at any time to open the account pop-up.
Accounts are free and take about twenty seconds to create. We never ask for a credit card during sign-up.
Checking which email you're signed in with. Look at the Account section in the top bar — the email appears as the subtitle under your display name. For more detail (current plan, sign out, reset password) click to open the pop-up.
Resetting your password while signed in. Open the Account pop-up and click Reset password. We'll email a single-use, time-limited reset link to the address on your account. Check your inbox and your spam folder.
Forgotten your password and can't sign in? On the sign-in pop-up, click Forgot password? Enter your email address and we'll send the same kind of reset link.
Deleting your saved data. Open the Account pop-up and click Delete all my saved data. This permanently removes every saved thread and saved analysis from your account, and scrubs matching entries from our audit log. Your account itself is not deleted — only the data you've saved. To delete your account entirely, email hello@helpp.site.
Signing out. Open the Account pop-up → Sign out. Useful on a shared computer.