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By Stephen Merrill Smith
Land use controls (LUCs) are legal restrictions that
protect the public from exposure to residual contamination at brownfields.
LUCs are designed to limit land use that might interfere with the
containment of residual contamination after completion of a cleanup.
For example, an LUC may prohibit excavation past a certain depth to
avoid disturbing contaminated soil. LUCs are typically used in tandem
with containment caps. In many cases, the parking lot on a
redeveloped brownfield may double as a containment cap that has
restrictions against excavation and requirements for periodic monitoring.
The key difficulty with LUCs is accurately tracking
the restriction on land use and getting that information to the right
people at the right time. Changes in owners and tenants can cause
LUCs to be lost over time, thus threatening a breach of containment that
would expose the public to hazardous residuals. This article explains how
the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has tasked Computer Sciences
Corporation and the International City/County Management Association to
develop a National Land Use Control Web Ring to make it easier to find land
use restriction information.
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