2C — July 12 - 25, 2013 — Pennsylvania — Mid Atlantic Real Estate Journal
www.marejournal.com
Hylant Environmental Risk Management
P ennsylvania
ignificant changes are on the way later in 2013 for the industry stan- By David s. Coyne, liberty Environmental, Inc. Phase I Enviro. site assessment standard Practice 2013 Changes S dress most of the more hotly debated questions. the new, simplified Definition of an REC
ENVIRONMENTAL INSURANCE SERVICES FOR:
Bruce W. Kranz | Senior Vice President 6000 Freedom Square Drive Suite 400 | Cleveland, OH 44131 | P: 216-674-2443 | C: 216-906-8898 | bruce.kranz@hylant.com | www.hylantenvironmental.com • Industrial and Manufacturing Facilities • Protection for Third Party Claims and Undiscovered Contamination • Mergers & Acquisition • Contaminated Properties • Environmental Contractors and Consultants • Brownfield Redevelopment • Real Estate Investment Portfolios
earlier that year as USEPA’s All Appropriate Inquiry Final Rule (40 CFR Part 312), the completion of a Phase I ESA meeting the AStM Standard Practice could provide the pro- tections for innocent landown- ers and bona-fide prospective purchasers of brownfields that are afforded under CERCLA. By linking itself to a federal rule in this fashion, the AStM Standard Practice, attained a rare status - a valuable private due diligence tool, but with regulatory clout. In the years since its de- velopment, Standard Prac- tice E1527 has become one of AStM’s most popular and widely-applied documents, with acceptance as a standard of practice across a range of users including lenders, real estate attorneys, land develop- ers, public sector agencies, and real estate investment trusts. An array of ancillary products and services such as private database search providers, his- torical data servers, training courses, books, websites, and specialized firms have grown around its broad utilization to these fields in the past 20 years. But in the 8 years since the 2005 version was issued, there has been continuing debate concerning the Standard’s application of AAI. Profes- sionals in the environmental community have also wrestled with issues such as what truly constitutes an environmental concern given the evolution of risk-based remedial strategies over the past 10 years, and whether (or how) critical expo- sure pathways such as vapor intrusion should be evaluated within the scope of an ESA. the 2013 changes seek to ad-
dard docu- me n t t h a t governs the performance of Phase I En- vironmental Site Assess- ments. Liber- ty’s early re- views of the
the identification of recog- nized environmental condi- tions (RECs) is one of the main objectives of the ESA process; it identifies conditions which may warrant further inves- tigation or pose a concern to future use or occupancy of a particular property. Until now, the specific definition of an REC has remained largely unchanged since the original draft of the Standard in 1993. the new definition of an REC, in the 2013 Standard, is much shorter (a mere 60 words as compared to its origi- nal 113) and removes much of the duplicate language that unnecessarily lengthened the old definition. It’s generally a simplification and clarifica- tion of the original wording, and seeks to more broadly state the scope, as well as the limitations, of what can be considered an REC. the new version also removes an entire exclusionary definition for de minimis conditions, which has more appropriately been moved to the Definitions sec- tion of the Standard. Part One of Three – To con- tinue in the July 26th ODM section. For a full version of article please contact Elaine Fanning at: efan- ning@marejournal.com David s. Coyne, QEP, Principal at liberty Envi- ronmental is an expert in real estate environmental advisory services, includ- ing complex due diligence evaluations and environ- mental decisionmaking for industrial and commercial property transactions. n
David S. Coyne
upcoming changes to AStM Standard Practice E1527 re- veal new definitions of what constitutes an environmental condition, new emphasis on vapor intrusion risks, and an increase in review and report- ing responsibilities for the environmental professionals preparing the assessments. this three-part series will take you through the modifications to one of the environmental in- dustry’s most important Stan- dards of Practice, and discuss the ways that these changes that will affect the performance of environmental assessments in 2013 and beyond. an Introduction: the 2005 standard and all appropriate Inquiry (aaI) the current AStM Standard Practice for ESAs that was released in 2005 (E1527-05) marked the most significant change in the ESA process since the standard was first published by AStM in 1993. the 2005 version incorporated the all appropriate inquiry (AAI) definitions that were established by the USEPA following the landmark 2002 Small Business Liability Relief and Revitalization Act (also known as the Brownfields AmendmentsAct to CERCLA). By incorporating these defini- tions, which had been set forth
Natural Resources Climate Change and Sustainability Air Quality Management Site Assessment and Remediation Regulatory Compliance and Planning Water Resource Management t t t t t t
The James Balliet Commercial Group
“The Lehigh Valley’s Premier Full Service Commercial Real Estate Company”
• Shopping Center Sales & Leasing • Retail, Office, Medical & Industrial Properties • Distressed Property & Asset Management • Tenant Representation • Business Brokerage • Commercial Land Brokerage • Multi Unit Apartments
610-435-4711
www.lehighvalleycommercial.com
KW Commercial | 40 S. Cedar Crest Blvd.| Allentown, PA 18104
Made with FlippingBook Annual report