DUE DILIGENCE SITE ASSESSMENTS

The Issues

Due diligence site assessments identify and assess potential environmental liabilities that a company, bank, investment firm, or an individual may encounter if they purchase a property's environmental liabilities along with its assets.

Too often new owners learn after a real estate purchase, that the property has hidden environmental liabilities for which they may be responsible.

The Implications

Purchasers can be held accountable for environmental site clean-up costs even if a previous owner has caused the contamination. Lenders can also be liable for cleanup costs and environmental damages on a borrower's property. Such properties are often discovered to be the source of off-site soil, groundwater and surface water contamination.

Specific services include:

• Site inspections to determine the potential for prior environmental damage
• Cataloging the history of operations and processes used on site
• Investigation of historic spills of hazardous substances
• Databases to catalog storage tanks, inventory hazardous substances, environmental data, etc
• Preparation of site maps showing the location of contamination
• Review of regulatory files for evidence of prior non-compliance
• Establishment of an environmental due diligence defense
• Preparation of a concise report for the site investigation, including an assessment of the potential liability and, if necessary, recommended remedial action
• Regulatory agency negotiations, if site cleanup is required

How Green-Tech Can Help

Green-Tech's due diligence site assessments provide a thorough review of existing and past practices at a site and assess the potential for present and future environmental problems. A site assessment can identify your potential liabilities and protect your investments from hidden costs.

Green-Tech's phased approach to site assessments provides flexible and high-quality due diligence investigations. Our environmental professionals have inspected property and facilities throughout Canada and the Unites States and have the capability for providing accurate information quickly and economically.

Green-Tech recognizes that environmental assessments are often required to be completed quickly to avoid a delay of the real estate transaction.

A property transfer assessment provides an accurate up to the minute evaluation of the property. This assessment then forms an integral part in establishing an environmental due diligence defense. Due diligence in turn provides protection against regulatory action and civil lawsuits.

© 2012 Green-Tech Environmental Engineering Ltd