I own a company in Denver and am seriously looking at purchasing a particular office/warehouse in town. The issue that has come up is that the unit sits on an EPA Superfund site, which they say has been cleaned up and signed off on as safe now. Decades ago it was a radium factory and the EPA removed about 100,000 tons of soil which was radioactive. Some is "capped" and still sits below existing buildings, but since it's covered up they say it's safe.
There are only a few of these Superfund sites around the state, and initially this doesn't sit well with me whether it's safe or not in terms of not only long term value but general health and peace of mind.
Does anyone have experience or insights of what to do with these EPA Superfund/Radium sites? This would be my first commercial purchase and I have no experience so I'm looking for help.
Do they have a no further action letter from the EPA? Ask for Phase I & II ESAs and talk with an attorney about your legal exposure (if any) and an environmental consultant about the clean up and health risk. Even if it's squeaky clean you'll also want environmental insurance if you move forward in case the EPA or a tenant comes after you. Once you take title they can come after you regardless of your roll in the contamination.
Do they have a no further action letter from the EPA? Ask for Phase I & II ESAs and talk with an attorney about your legal exposure (if any) and an environmental consultant about the clean up and health risk. Even if it's squeaky clean you'll also want environmental insurance if you move forward in case the EPA or a tenant comes after you. Once you take title they can come after you regardless of your roll in the contamination.
Thanks for the input. There is a letter from the EPA regarding the situation but it's not addressed to the owner of this property, but one next to it in the same building. There is now Phase I or II ESA available from what we know, so it looks like I would have to pay for that as part of the deal. Given the situation and what you listed above, I'm most likely not moving forward with this.
You should be able to see EPA documents on their website here. Scroll down and put inj the address and then click Map It. You can click on the symbol that appears to see what information they have online.
I just did a BP blog post on the EPA website at this link. Hopefully the website may help you.
if its part of the superfund there's a mile long paper trail and probably existing monitoring wells in place. Letter needs to address the property in question.
EPA superfund sites have a way of coming back to life. This is not always the case, but sometimes they find that the remediation doesn't work like they thought it would, they find more contamination, they find other contaminates, or etc.
Another consideration is that the cap can limit future development. You can't dig through or into the cap to construct utilities or foundations.
All of that said there are a number of brownfields around the US that have been brought back to life by redevelopment.
The risk would be that you, your employees health and equipment are impacted by the contamination. I think that is extremely low probability. Unless your business could contribute to contamination, you probably are fairly well protected by the Superfund status but if one of the ifs comes true it will impact your business.
Just know that anyone buying it from you will have the same questions. I would pass unless you feel the price reflects the potential limitations and risk of the situation.