Paul M. Hauge, an attorney in the Gibbons law firm’s Environmental Department, details changes recently made to New Jersey’s site-remediation law. This may be of interest to Licensed Site Remediation Professionals, developers, and property owners.
Paul M. Hauge,
By Paul M. Hauge
In 2009, in the face of a significant backlog of sites that were stuck in the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) pipeline, the New Jersey Legislature dramatically changed the process of site remediation in the Garden State with the enactment of the Site Remediation Reform Act (SRRA). The SRRA partially outsourced DEP’s review role by authorizing “private” oversight of cleanups by Licensed Site Remediation Professionals (LSRPs). On August 23, 2019, Governor Murphy signed new legislation that made further adjustments to the changes wrought by the SRRA.
The legislation (L. 2019, c. 263), which sailed through both legislative chambers without a single opposing vote, makes a number of changes to the LSRP program, as well as other changes affecting parties responsible for conducting remediation projects.
Amendments Affecting LSRPs
Removal of unoccupied structures from list of areas that must be addressed as an “immediate environmental concern.”
Expansion of LSRP duties to report immediate environmental concerns and previously unreported discharges.
A slight relaxation of licensing requirements for individuals who may have temporarily left the workforce for personal reasons.
Clarification of prior acts and punishments that will disqualify a person from obtaining an LSRP license.
Tightening of LSRPs’ oversight responsibilities to ensure that non-LSRPs do not effectively perform work reserved for LSRPs.
Requiring an affidavit of merit from any party who sues an LSRP for malpractice or negligence.
Amendments Affecting Parties Responsible for Conducting Remediation
Windels Marx has announced the arrival of Partner Isabel D. Chou, resident in the New Brunswick, NJ office. Isabel’s practice focuses on affordable housing, redevelopment, municipal and nonprofit law.
A news release describes her as experienced with the complex structuring and financing of affordable housing and redevelopment projects using federal, state and local government subsidy and incentive programs. She has worked with a range of public housing authorities, municipalities and private developers in the transformation of outdated publicly- and privately-run multifamily housing projects.
Robert J. Luddy, Managing Partner, who has led the firm’s expansion in recent years with lawyers focused in intellectual property, real estate, finance, corporate, bankruptcy, trusts and estates, and probate litigation, said of Isabel’s arrival, “We are committed to deepening our existing strengths and diversifying our practice mix in areas suited to our clients’ needs. We welcome Isabel and particularly her affordable housing, redevelopment and nonprofit experience.”
Prior to becoming a lawyer, Chou spent ten years in nonprofit program management and organizational development, primarily focused on children’s health and education advocacy. She continues to serve as an active committee volunteer for various nonprofit organizations around the country, including the Waterfront Project, a free legal clinic in Hudson County, New Jersey, and the Ricci Institute for Chinese-Western Cultural History at the University of San Francisco in California.
Chou received her J.D. from Rutgers University in Newark, where she was also an editor of the Rutgers Law Review; her M.P.A. from the University of San Francisco; and her B.A. from the University of California, Berkeley. She was a law clerk to the Honorable Carmen Messano in the Appellate Division of the New Jersey Superior Courts.
She is licensed to practice in New Jersey and New York.
Windels Marx now has 143 lawyers firmwide, of which 75 lawyers are licensed to practice in New Jersey and 131 in New York.
If your firm has news of likely interest to our readers, send it to editor@enviropolitics.com for our consideration.
After five months mired in the day-to-day grind of a struggling presidential campaign, the El Paso massacre shook something loose in Beto O’Rourke.
After spending more than a week grieving with his fellow El Pasoans, O’Rourke emerged to recast his presidential bid with an expression of “what the fuck?” sentiment reminiscent of his Senate run. In a speech earlier this month, he declared that he was now running with the primary purpose of confronting Trump and his willful provocation of racial violence.
By making Trump’s racism, guns, and immigration the central focus of his presidential campaign and traveling to states that are usually ignored in the primaries, O’Rourke is leaving behind the conventional, inside-the-lines approach that has resulted in his consistent polling below 3 percent.
The spontaneous, just-do-what-feels-right shift—the kind that tends to give campaign operatives and donors the cold sweats—is a callback to the sort of anti-conformist political instincts that helped elevate him to the presidential race in the first place. But will this earnest crusade jumpstart his campaign?
PRESIDENT TRUMP’S Environmental Protection Agency moved Thursday to lift limits on potent greenhouse gas emissions from the drilling and transportation of natural gas, a major fuel source for electric power plants, heating systems and industrial processes. Not only would this be bad for the environment, but also it might well do more harm than good for the fossil-fuel industry.
The United States has enjoyed an energy revolution over the past decade as hydraulic fracturing and horizontal-drilling technologies unlocked huge amounts of domestically produced natural gas. The massive new supply of fuel has driven down gas prices and helped it displace coal, which is the worst environmental villain in the electricity sector. When natural gas is burned in power plants, it emits roughly half the heat-trapping carbon dioxide that burning coal produces and minuscule amounts of the noxious chemicals and particulates that sicken those living nearby.
But there is a very big catch. Natural gas is mostly methane. When allowed to waft into the atmosphere uncombusted, methane is an extremely potent greenhouse agent on its own. Though it lingers in the atmosphere for less time than carbon dioxide, methane is some 80 times more capable a heat-trapper over a 20-year time span. If one takes seriously expert warnings about avoiding dangerous near-term climate tipping points, after which temperatures could enter an upward spiral, restraining methane emissions is a key climate goal.
So when methane leaks from natural gas wells, storage tanks or pipelines, the fuel’s environmental impact suddenly looks much worse. Researchers, industry groups and federal standard-setters have debated how big a problem methane leakage is and how much it detracts from the appeal of natural gas as a bridge fuel between fossil fuels and renewables. But substantial recentresearch suggests that the country’s methane leakage rate has been much higher than the federal estimates that had made natural gas look like an environmental and economic miracle. Natural gas producers could argue that breakneck coal-to-gas switching had driven down official power-sector emissions estimates over the past decade. But it was becoming harder to accept that the environmental benefits were as pronounced.
That is why the industry should have welcomed President Barack Obama’s moves to require methane emissions control in natural gas production and transportation, rules that came into force in 2016. In fact, several major fossil-fuel players have embraced the regulations. For relatively inexpensive upgrades and procedures that enable natural gas producers to capture and sell more product, the rules allowed the industry to argue that methane leakage across the industry would be minimized and that natural gas could be, at least for a time, part of a serious climate strategy.
Yet others opposed the new rules. This is no surprise, given recent research on methane leakage, which found massive leaks from relatively few “superemitters” in the business. The regulations would have hit bad actors hardest; the bad actors did not like that. And the Trump administration just sided with them.
The EPA’s proposal would substantially weaken the Obama-era rules and keep natural gas’s reputation tarnished — all to save the industry a mere $17 million to $19 million a year. It is counterproductive in every conceivable sense.
By John Herzfeld, Bloomberg Environment Staff Correspondent
A newly enacted New Jersey law updates the state’s system for cleaning up polluted sites—and more changes may be in the works in the next legislative session.
The law, passed by legislators in late June and signed Aug. 23 by New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy (D), makes the first major changes in a decade to the state’s Site Remediation Reform Act (SRRA). The new law is also known as SRRA 2.0.
Sponsors said the bill (S-3862/A-5293) is intended to build on experience implementing the original 2009 law, streamlining a process that has resulted in significant new site remediation efforts statewide. New Jersey has more contaminated sites than any other state—including 114 in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s federal Superfund program—underscoring the importance of the work to future land use.
“Updating this law will allow for more sites to be remediated at a more efficient rate,” state Sen. Linda Greenstein (D), vice-chair of the state Senate Environment and Energy Committee, said in a statement when the bill passed the legislature.
The changes stem from two years of discussion among interested groups about the law’s workings.
“You really don’t know a law until you’ve lived with it for a while,” Ray Cantor, vice president of the New Jersey Business & Industry Association, said in an Aug. 29 interview. “Cleaning up a site involves a lot of detailed procedures. The new law fixes a lot of little things, and those add up to good process improvements.”
Another Look Next Year?
More changes may be in store in the next legislative session. The new bill represented an effort by organizations active in cleanups to tackle consensus items first and hold the “more contentious and more difficult issues” for later, he said. The association will be working with the business community to identify areas for wider reforms, Cantor said.
The legislature will begin a new term in January, after elections this November.
But Michael Novak, president of Atlantic Environmental Solutions Inc. in Hoboken, N.J., said he doesn’t expect further changes to the law at that point, “in either direction, whether you’d call it business-friendly or environment-friendly.”
The new law was thoroughly discussed among interested groups and represents the best approach to “protecting the environment without being onerous to the regulated community,” said Novak, a longtime remediation consultant who participated in the discussions leading up to the bill’s passage.
Clarifies Reporting
The law didn’t attempt a wholesale revision to the program but just refined several provisions, with almost all the changes concerned with housekeeping matters or clarifying language, Novak said.
Among the process changes that will improve and speed cleanups are provisions clarifying the reporting responsibilities of licensed site remediation professionals (LSRPs), he said; Novak’s organization was one of the first LSRPs certified under the state program.
Any remediation project might have several such professionals working on a site, but before the new law, it wasn’t clear how one of them would report contamination found at a part of the site handled by another one. The new law clarifies the responsibilities of these professionals to report contamination to the person responsible for the cleanup and to the state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP).
SRRA 2.0 doesn’t have major statutory amendments, but does offer “some benefits to the public and the development community,” said Jeffrey W. Cappola, a shareholder with the law firm Wilentz Goldman & Spitzer P.A. in Woodbridge, N.J., who lectures on site remediation and has served on several state regulatory committees.
One such benefits is that the person responsible for the cleanup is required to give the municipality and county health department notice before a remedial investigation begins, which allows for more transparency, Cappola said in an Aug. 29 email. And the responsible person must respond in writing to public inquiries regarding the environmental condition of a site, he said.
Redevelopers Support, Activists Sour
“I think the best news for redevelopers is that the amendments do not seriously undercut any of the major provisions of the LSRP program,” said Bruce S. Katcher of the Cherry Hill, N.J., law firm Manko Gold Katcher & Fox LLP.
The LSRP program has sped up environmentally protective remediation projects by eliminating significant delays that marked a previous program, overseen by state case managers, Katcher said in an Aug. 29 email. The new law keeps the LSRP program intact and ensures it will continue to operate effectively, he said.
“Continuity breeds certainty, which is something of tremendous importance to developers as well as lenders and insurance companies—the latter two of which are also important players in the redevelopment process,” he added.
The public and the environment will benefit from a new section of the law that encourages green and sustainable practices in cleanups, said Geri L. Albin, counsel at the law firm Saiber LLC in Florham Park, N.J., in an Aug. 29 email.
“This could be the start to additional incentives,” she said.
But Jeff Tittel, director of the New Jersey Sierra Club, said the new law gives private consultants more authority, and undermines transparency and oversight.
“Our concerns with the original law have been magnified by these amendments,” he said in an Aug. 29 interview. He called the bill “a sellout to polluters and developers,” arguing that it will protect private contractors from being held responsible for accidents, spills, or mistakes.
The Sierra Club has received funding from Bloomberg Philanthropies, the charitable organization founded by Michael Bloomberg. Bloomberg Environment is operated by entities controlled by Michael Bloomberg.
By John George – Senior Reporter, Philadelphia Business Journal
The Philadelphia region’s first medical marijuana grower/processor is on schedule to begin shipping product in October.
Agri-Kind’s indoor growing facility in Chester received operating approval from the Pennsylvania Department of Health in June and began growing its first plants in late July.
“We expect to have our first harvest in mid-October, and we are looking to start shipping by the end of that month,” said Jon Cohn, CEO of Agri-Kind.
Cohn said the first phase of construction for the nondescript complex on Broomall Street along the Chester Waterfront between Talen Energy Stadium and Harrah’s Philadelphia Casino and Racetrack is expected to be completed within the next few weeks. The company’s original plan was to wait until next year to begin the second phase to create additional capacity. But supply shortages statewide has led to work on the expansion beginning right away, Cohn said.
“Pittsburgh is dry right now and the Philadelphia-area dispensaries are in short supply,” he said.
Agri-Kind spent $18.2 million to get its facility operational. Cohn estimates the final cost for the 62,000-square-foot complex, when both phases are completed, at between $23 million and $25 million.
The company initially hoped to open for business in February but encountered some delays. Working through the local zoning approval process took longer than expected, as did tearing down a condemned city high department garage on its property after asbestos was found. The company also had to replace its initial construction manager and replace them with Philadelphia-based Palmer Construction.
“It’s been a challenging process,” Cohn said. “I can’t say enough good things about Palmer Construction.”
The medical marijuana facility has 20 employees now, and that number is expected to grow to about 85 when the complex is fully operational. The jobs being created include growers, trimmers, extractors, chemists, compliance staff and security.
“We are doing it in stages,” Cohn said. “We have 20 people now, but when the first harvest is ready we’ll have to bring in 15 trimmers right away.”
Trimmers are people trained to properly trim and prune cannabis flowers to maximize the parts of the plants that produce medical compounds cannabidiol (CBD) and tetrahydrocannabinol (THC).
Cohn wants to hire as many local qualified people as possible. The company has already held two job fairs the meet with potential employees.
As for production, Cohn said Agri-Kind’s approach was to plant seeds for 300 different strains of medical marijuana with a goal of finding about 80 that are best suited for this area to clone and make part of its product offerings.
“You really have to grow in your environment to know what you’re dealing with,” he said. “We know not everything we are working with now will make it.… Certain plants, for example, do better with certain lighting. We are using LED lighting so we need to figure out which do best with that.”
The company is aiming to have a variety of products to meet the different needs and preferences of customers.
“Some strains are better for pain and some are better for anxiety,” Cohn said. “We want to have five to seven strains for each indication (for which the use of medical marijuana is approved in Pennsylvania) across the board. There’s also the flavor profile. Some may have a berry flavor and other a more earthy flavor. We want to have a broad array.”
In the Southeastern Pennsylvania region for Pennsylvania’s medical marijuana program — which includes Philadelphia and its surrounding four suburban counties plus Berks, Schuylkill and Lancaster counties — the other medical marijuana grower/processors to receives licenses are: Prime Wellness in Sinking Spring, Berks County; Franklin Labs in Reading, Berks County; and DocHouse of Pottsville, Schuylkill County.
Prime Wellness is the only grower in the region currently shipping product, according to a spokeswoman for the Pennsylvania Department of Health.
The five-county Philadelphia region got its 20th medical marijuana dispensary earlier this week when Beyond/Hello, which is owned by Jushi Holdings of Boca Raton, Florida, opened its third local dispensary at 475 N. 5th St. in the Northern Liberties section of Philadelphia. St. Beyond/Hello also has dispensaries at 12th and Sansom streets in Center City and in Bristol, Bucks County.
