I was pleased to facilitate a panel session at the N BAs’ Big Deal conference this past October. The session explored the concept of national certification for brownfield professionals, the subject of October BFN’s “View from the Field.” One focus of the session was on identifying the attributes required for practitioners working on brownfield investigations beyond the Phase I due diligence level. Representatives from key states and provinces that have brownfield professional certification programs, including British Columbia, California, Connecticut, Illinois, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Ohio discussed the highlights and effectiveness of their own state certification programs.

National U.S. Certification
Don Richardson, president of the Institute of Brownfield Professionals (IBP) presented the goals of the IBP, which are to:

• Certify environmental professionals, particularly at the Phase II level
• Promote ethical business practices
• Sponsor education and training
• Promote access to service providers nationally, and
• Promote the profession.

IBP certification goes beyond what is required to meet the All Appropriate Inquiry (AAI) environmental professional definition. The IBP certification emphasizes working with a professional who has full-time relevant field experience in designing and implementing remediation programs. To qualify for IBP certification, applicants must meet specific standards for education, professional licensure and years of experience; provide references and detailed experience records; and fulfill continuing education requirements. The self-regulating program requires no exam.

State Programs
States and provinces have evolved varying systems for qualifying brownfield professionals to work with and, in some states, act on behalf of state regulatory agencies. In some jurisdictions where the workload is great, private practitioners are licensed to conduct investigations on behalf of the agencies. This allows state employees to work in other areas and speeds up the approval process. Levels of responsibility range from simply providing services to a private client for Phase I and II investigations to oversight of investigations and cleanups and the write up of No Further Action letters, as is the case in Ohio. In all cases, states maintain oversight on the quality of work performed by auditing a certain percentage of investigations conducted each year.

Liability protection is a key issue. Most brownfield professionals are members of engineering companies, which typically provide liability protection for their employees. However, some brownfield practitioners are sole individuals or members of small companies with limited liability insurance. According to the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection’s fact sheet on waste site cleanup, Massachusetts provides liability protection to an eligible person, which may include the licensed practitioner, from site-related state claims and third party suits. Most other states do not provide similar liability protection.

The quality of brownfield practitioners’ products can be an issue. In all states, the certified professional is obligated to enforce all state regulations and procedures. Massachusetts reviewed the quality of licensed site professional (LSP) reports and decisions and found enough discrepancies to form a self-regulating disciplinary committee to censure poorly performing LSPs. British Columbia created a formal society of like-focused brownfield professionals to define and self-regulate their brownfield development program.

Is Broader Certification Needed?
States with many brownfields have created approaches to deal with their own state issues. A general consensus of panelists was that a national/international registry of certified brownfield professionals potentially could:

• Complement more rigorous state licensing programs
• Give clients more certainty as they hire professionals in different states
• Allow professionals to work in different states
• Establish national baseline standards for brownfield investigation professionals, and
• Promote more consistent competence in investigations and remediation.

The need for certification is not widely accepted, but certainly the advantages can only serve to protect the integrity of the industry.

Ken Kastman is a vice president and senior principal engineer with URS Corp. in Chicago.