An APZ or Asset Protection Zone is an area that is “low risk” measured from a dwelling to native vegetation within the lot.
The APZ is required to be managed to lower the BAL Rating to an acceptable level. You will get the APZ distance from the bushfire consultant, BAL Report or similar document like a Bushfire Management Plan(BMP).
In the below picture you can see the 21m APZ in orange, it extends from both:
#1. Class 1a Dwelling and #3. Class 10a Shed this is because the shed is within 6m of the dwelling, now the APZ is required to extend from that shed structure also.
When you submit the BAL documents and get approval from your Local Government Authority (LGA) to modify your lot specific APZ to a low risk state it is the landowners responsibility to understand what vegetation modification is required inside the APZ and to implement the changes before a BAL Certificate is issued to grant a building permit.
The details can be confusing for someone that does not understand the Standards for APZ’s so we will explain further in a separate blog on what is the simple way to work our way through this.