Online Resources for Environmental Site Assessments

by

Peter Haxton

http://academic.emporia.edu/abersusa/gis/haxton/

This webpage project was created for a course on map librarianship from Emporia State University in the 2007 spring semester. The assignment was to relate a topic of interest to maps and other spatial data, as well as to learn webpage creation.

Table of Contents


Image from Environmental Protection Agency
www.epa.gov/epaoswer/osw/hazwaste.htm

Introduction

Environmental Site Assessment (ESA) is a method to assess the presence of potential environmental hazards on a piece of land. These assessments are often conducted on properties during a sale or other transaction at the behest of banks or other lending institutions or insurance companies. Put simply, the goal of an ESA is to protect a buyer or other party who has financial interest in a property from liability that would arise from an environmental hazard being discovered on the property.

Until recently, there were no Federal regulations describing how and by whom an ESA could be conducted. Environmental professionals and financial institutions sought a standard from the Federal government. On November 1, 2006 the Environmental Protection Agency created the All Appropriate Inquiry (www.epa.gov/swerosps/bf/regneg.htm) and these standards took effect with respect to conducting environmental site assessments (EPA, 2006).

The All Appropriate Inquiry created a standard of the information product to be presented to the client and a standard of the level of education and preofessional experience required to perform the work. The new standard requires: This standardized how and by whom ESAs were to be conducted.

The new standard also dictated how and by whom ESAs were to be conducted and defined a qualified environmental professional as either:

Records Available Online

As with many federal regulations, the All Appropriate Inquiry standard makes broad statements about what needs to be done, without clarifying how or to what extent. The name of the standard itself is ambiguous. What, after all, is "appropriate?" The wise professional would be one who exhausted as many resources as possible, aiming for over and above, rather than good enough. This website is an attempt to collect and consolidate reputable source of information for key areas in ESA reporting in a single place.

Online Maps

In order to understand and evaluate a target site, the environmental professional must be able to "see" and represent that site through maps. It is unlikely that most firms conducting ESAs will have a substantial map collection. Fortunately there are many sources of online maps available.

Topographic quadrangles are the standard for depicting large areas and necessary for determining surface gradients. Topographic maps are available through terraserver.microsoft.com, Terraserver-USA. Terraserver also has available satellite photography. The map library at the www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/united_states.html, University of Texas, includes some topo maps sorted by state. Another useful resource is the nationalmap.gov/, National Map, which can be used to design maps for target properties that depict important layers of information.
Image from USGS www.usgs.gov/aboutusgs/.

Geologic Information

The subsurficial geology of a target property can tell the professional much about the potential for contaminants to remain onsite or to migrate from adjacent sites. Unfortunately it can be difficult, costly or inconvenient to find paper geologic maps for a specific target property. Fortunately, many such maps are available online.

The United States Geological Survey (USGS) is an obvious first place to look. The USGS maintains the ngmdb.usgs.gov/, National Geologic Map Database, a database of geologic maps, many of which are available online.

The Associatioin of www.stategeologists.org, American State Geologists, keeps a list of all state geologic surveys, many of whom have maps available online.

Soils

Understanding local soils also casts light on understanding contaminant migration. The National Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) maintains a number of online resources. The NRCS has some complete soil surveys, soils.usda.gov/survey/online_surveys/, available online. The Official Soil Series Descriptions, soils.usda.gov/technical/classification/osd/index.html, have a complete description of each soil series and has the capability to map series extent. The NRCS' Web Soil Survey, websoilsurvey.nrcs.usda.gov/app/, is an interactive mapping tool with limited soil series data available as layers on the map.

Wetlands


Image show from National Wetlands
Inventory www.fws.gov/nwi/
Most wetlands are protected under federal law. As such, it is imperative for environmental professionals to be able to advise their clients on the location of wetlands with respect to the target property.

Using the Fish and Wildlife Service's wetlandsfws.er.usgs.gov/wtlnds/launch.html, Wetlands Online Mapper, one can identify potential wetland areas prior to the site visit, and field verify.

Flood Plains

This level of information may exceed the average appropriate inquiry, but it is potentially valuable information and is necessary if the project falls under the restrictions of the National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA). The Federal Emergency Management Agency oversees the creation and publication of flood maps.

The Map Service Center provides a searchable database of available digital Flood Insurance Rate Maps (FIRMs). These maps can be purchased or downloaded for free.
Image from US Fish and Wildlife Service
www.fws.gov/endangered/

Other Topics

There are a number of other topics that are often included in ESAs, such as occurances of threatened or endangered species, physiographic region in which the target property lies and radon gas issues.

The Fish and Wildlife Service maintains a database of threatened and endangered species call ecos.fws.gov/tess_public/StartTESS.do">, TESS. This system will list threatened and endangered species by state, but unfortunately does not include maps of known extent of the species. Those maps are often available directly from the state's equivalent agency.

Many ESA reports include the physiographic region. Often the physiographic region is defined in the soil survey report. If not, the USGS's Tapestry of Time and Terrain map, tapestry.usgs.gov/physiogr/physio.html, shows large scale physiographic regions.

Although not as trendy and environmental fear as it once was, potential for radon exposure is still a topic that many professionals choose to address. The EPA provides a map of radon zones, www.epa.gov/radon/zonemap.html. The map only shows the zones to the county level.

Conclusion

The EPA's All Appropriate Inquiry rule was an attempt to bring some order and continuity to ESAs. Although the standard is a bit vague, it is clear that environmental professionals conducting ESAs must either find all available infomration about a subject site, or explain the gaps in their information. This page was created to provide a single source for locating some core information ofr the ESA online.

References

EPA. (2005). All Appropriate Inquiry Final Rule Factsheet. Retrieved April 30, 2007 from www.epa.gov/swerosps/bf/aai/aai_final_factsheet.htm.

EPA. (2006). All Appropriate Inquiry Rule: Reporting Requirements and Suggestions on Report Content. Retrieved April 30, 2007 from www.epa.gov/swerosps/bf/aai/AAI_Reporting_FactSheet.pdf.

Return to other student webpages at academic.emporia.edu/abersusa/gis/students/students.htm.

For more information, or if you have comments, please contact Peter Haxton. Webpage created May 11, 2007.