Business sectors around the world are "going green" in order to become better environmental stewards and the business of cleaning up and revitalizing contaminated sites is no different. In recent years EPA has sought to increase the sustainability of redevelopment at previously contaminated sites. More recently there has been increasing interest in EPA's Office of Solid Waste and Emergency Response (OSWER) in identifying best practices that will help reduce the environmental footprint of the actual site cleanup activities. The concept is being termed "green remediation".
"Green remediation" is the practice of considering all environmental effects of remedy implementation, and incorporating options to maximize net environmental benefit of contaminated site cleanup projects. Sustainable cleanup practices place greater emphasis on considering a project's energy requirements, air emissions, water consumption, impacts on land and ecosystems, material consumption and waste generation, and impacts on long-term stewardship of a site. The concept of green remediation builds on environmentally conscious practices already used across business and public sectors, but seeks ways to adapt and adopt state-of-the-art practices and products to reduce the environmental footprints at cleanup projects, regardless of the regulatory framework. The session will focus on exactly how a site cleanup can go greener, examining our usual ways of doing business to find more opportunities to conserve natural resources and energy.