Brownfields, leftovers of industry, pose environmental risks

Wyatt Loy

Factories and steel mills produce a lot of toxins and pollutants that are good neither for the people who live in surrounding areas nor the land upon which they are built. When these industrial areas shut down or move elsewhere, those toxins stay with the community and with that land.

"Brownfields are properties, formerly industrial or urban use properties that are prevented from attaining their highest and best use because of actual or perceived contamination," said Robert Simons, professor and former director of urban planning and design at Cleveland State University. "Typical one would be a gas station, having gas in the tank leak, and there's a plume of chemicals that went from the gas station to the nearby properties."

When the contamination in a brownfield grows to such a point where it becomes threatening to life in the area, it is then classified as a Superfund site by the EPA. The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) of 1980 authorized the EPA to designate sites as Superfunds and fund their cleanup in the absence of a responsible party. The process for identifying and remediating brownfields and Superfunds are practically the same, but the latter often involves far more work--and parties responsible for Superfunds can be subject to high penalties under the law.

So far, the EPA lists 37 Superfund sites as "National Priorities" in the state of Ohio, including nearby locations in Copley and Deerfield Township.

Even Kent has it's own brownfield: A 14-acre lot on Lake Street formerly owned by Ametek. Ametek did not respond immediately to an email for comment.

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Brownfields not only tank the value of the land they pollute, but the vicinity around it as well. Simons said properties in the area of a current or former groundwater polluter, for example, can suffer property value reductions in the range of 10 to 20%. But the economical blight is only a small part of the problem. According to the EPA, brownfields pose safety and public health concerns. Abandoned or compromised structures, open foundations, controlled substance sites (e.g. meth labs) and abandoned mine sites all pose physical safety issues.

Contamination of soil tends to stay where it is, Simons said, but water and air contamination are susceptible to spreading, potentially to areas far from the original brownfield.

"Groundwater pollution in an area with wells can make people sick in a real hurry. Groundwater moves, you know, inches or feet a year depending on sand or gravel or whatnot, right?" Simons said. "And it gets into the groundwater aquifers and it can taint your drinking water, but it could be in a non-drinking water aquifer."

Blighted areas may also lead to higher crime rates, which reduce property values and lead to lower tax funds for local governments, which in turn leads to lower availability of social programs in affected communities. That reduced social capital or lost community connections, the EPA said on its website, contribute to a lower overall quality of life.

According to the Center for Health, Environment and Justice, higher levels of cancer, birth defects, developmental disabilities and other serious health issues are associated with proximity to a Superfund site.

"Children have a much higher rate of exposure to environmental toxicants than adults, as they have higher intakes of water, food, and air than adults in relation to body weight," CHEJ said on its website. "Additionally, this higher rate of exposure is exacerbated by common behaviors of children, such as hand-to-mouth behavior, and playing close to the ground when outside. Because of this higher rate of toxicant exposure, as well as their lessened ability to metabolize and excrete toxicants, children living or going to school on or near Superfund sites are particularly vulnerable to health issues."

Childhood exposure to Superfund sites is also linked to lower cognitive functioning and decreased performance in school. Pregnant women are also particularly susceptible to health issues when in proximity to these areas, with 20 to 25% higher risk of having a child with congenital birth defects than those living near a remediated site.

"The clean up of the active leaking underground storage tanks, and with the Superfund sites, that's all been sorted out '70s, '80s, '90s and early 2000s," Simons said. "There's not a lot of surprises left. But if these polluted sites got into groundwater, and then people using wells and getting cancer, that's the kind of situation where the state's going to jump in."

The process is long, but brownfields can be remediated. Ohio has a voluntary, private sector-driven brownfield cleanup system, which usually starts with a developer buying the contaminated property at a low cost.

"The new owner will hire an environmental professional consultant and they will come up with a plan," Simons said. "[They're] going to grab surface samples, and maybe some groundwater or subsurface sampling. And then you're going to analyze what's in there, and then you'll come up with a heat map of the bad stuff. And then at that point, the developer is going to say, 'Okay, it's gonna cost me this much to clean it up, and here's what I can make.'"

Between testing and cleanup, the price tag can be upwards of a couple million dollars and months of work, Simons said--and that's just for soil contamination. The process becomes longer and more expensive if there's groundwater pollution, but the developer can apply for tax subsidies and grants to offset that cost.

In the 1990s, the EPA started funding local government, tribal and community efforts to assess and facilitate brownfield remediation. In 2002, Congress passed the Small Business Liability Relief and Brownfields Revitalization Act, also known as the “Brownfields Law," which codified many of the programs the EPA had already done, and expanded their capabilities.

The type of contamination onsite and the future plans for the property determine the intensity of the cleanup process.

"You can never get everything 100% clean, you just get it down to an action level that is suitable for the use," Simons said. "So let's say the building has got to be quite clean, because you're going to have people living in there. But the backyard's going to be under a parking lot. That's not such a big deal, right? You're not going to have a children's play area back there."

Eventually the brownfield is cleaned up or sealed to prevent spreading, and the developer sells the property for a profit.

Since the Brownfields Law and CERCLA were passed, the Ohio EPA created an 'Ohio Brownfields' program which "maintains Ohio’s Brownfield Inventory of sites at which response actions may occur in the next year, coordinates targeted brownfield assessments for communities, conducts outreach and training to local governments concerning brownfield issues, and provides community revitalization support to local governments in locating funding."

Brownfields not only bring down the value of a community, but harm the people living around them. Read the first in my two-part series on brownfields and Superfunds #MDJRPP ⬇️https://t.co/vNloU83Dgr

— Wyatt Loy (@wyattloy) October 26, 2021