West Virginia DEP Continues Work on Long Term Brownfields Maintenance Program

Remediation of land contamination is seldom completed at the time earth moving ends. Cleaning up contaminants to background levels is usually not cost-effective or necessary, as long as future exposure to the contaminants will be limited. That might be done by, for example, by placing a concrete cover over the affected area, or putting a restriction in the deed against use of the land for residential housing. Those institutional and environmental control obligations stretch into the future, and there's always a chance that the party who makes the commitment won't be around in the future to maintain physical structures, or that the protections will simply be forgotten.

In order to provide for long term closure obligations, the DEP is establishing a program to carry out long term maintenance. Here's a fact sheet explaining the process, which opens with the following explanation of the program:

In February 2009, the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection (WVDEP) established the WV Institutional Controls Focus Group (IC Focus Group) to provide an independent perspective to WVDEP about the feasibility of utilizing a public-private land stewardship program for the long-term safeguarding of remediated sites using institutional controls (ICs) and engineering controls (ECs) (collectively, IECs) to ensure that the remedy remains protective of human health and the environment. . .

The primary outcomes of this initiative will be recommendations and pre-implementation activities concerning the structure and operation of the voluntary land stewardship program. To date, this effort has resulted in an agreed organizational structure, site acceptance criteria and procedures, model agreements, as well as approaches to inspection, monitoring, reporting and notice.

Beginning later this year, several pilot projects will be conducted to demonstrate, strengthen and refine the proposed program. The pilot sites include sites from the State Voluntary Remediation Program (VRP) and completing corrective-action under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA). In addition, financial analysis will be conducted to ensure the design of a viable entity with the necessary safeguards and standards needed for a permanent perpetual-care solution. Approximately a year after the pilots are implemented, the voluntary land stewardship program will begin to offer its services to the public and will accept additional sites into the program. The program will be available for sites with IECs remediated or closed under any federal or State environmental or remediation program, including brownfields, underground storage tanks, landfill closures, open dumps, hazardous waste sites, or sites with ongoing water treatment as part of mine reclamation efforts. More detailed information is available in the WV Institutional Controls Focus Group Interim Report dated September 9, 2010.

Thanks to Rob Lannan of Robinson & McElwee and others who worked on this process.