The New York State Department of Health (NYSDOH) in late February 2024 announced an update to its Guidance for Evaluating Soil Vapor Intrusion in the State of New York. For the first time, the Soil Vapor/Indoor Air Decision...more
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is in the process of rulemaking to adopt a new national standard for Phase I environmental site assessments. While the EPA had hoped to adopt the new Phase I standard more...more
On December 1, 2021, the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality (“VDEQ”) announced via a notice on its Brownfields website that it stopped accepting applications for Bona Fide Prospective Purchase (“BFPP”) and other...more
Governor Cuomo’s FY 2022 Budget provides relief to participants in the New York State Brownfield Cleanup Program (BCP) that risk losing their Tangible Property Tax Credit due to pandemic-related and other delays....more
The federal Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act of 1980 (“CERCLA”), also known as the Superfund law, has been used successfully to clean up abandoned industrial sites across the country....more
American environmental laws can be daunting for a foreign investor. For example, both federal and state laws can impose strict liability, which is liability regardless of fault or intent, on the owner or tenant of a...more
Maine’s Voluntary Response Action Program (VRAP) was enacted in 1993 to encourage the cleanup and redevelopment of Maine’s contaminated properties....more
Despite last minute veto threats from the White House, the bipartisan Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2018 was signed into law earlier this year. Buried deep in this massive omnibus spending bill is a major win for...more
Property owners in California may have access to state funds for environmental cleanup of smaller brownfields projects. The money comes from two pieces of environmental legislation passed in 2014....more
The cost to obtain liability protection under Maine’s very popular Voluntary Response Action Program (VRAP) will soon increase. Effective January 1, 2018, the cost of Maine DEP assistance in reviewing a voluntary response...more
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency recently issued two guidelines with far-reaching implications for real estate transactions involving contaminated sites, including sites owned by the Department of Defense. The...more
Tenants who lease currently or formerly contaminated property can now benefit from protections from cleanup liability that were once available only to purchasers of such property. EPA announced its new policy in a December...more
As part of an evolving effort to encourage the redevelopment of brownfield properties, the federal Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act (“CERCLA” or “Superfund”) was amended in 2002 to provide...more