Superfund Redevelopment: Challenges Create Opportunities for Sophisticated Parties

Despite their heightened environmental issues, Superfund sites designated by the United States Environmental Protection Agency can present significant opportunities due to, among other things, their locations in urban cores and larger property sizes. While redeveloping these sites can present significant challenges, success can be realized by the proper use of regulatory, contractual, and other mechanisms to allocate and mitigate risks. Assembling an environmental team from the initial phases of project consideration (such as prior to acquisition), including engaging legal counsel and environmental consultants, can allow proper planning that is needed to complete redevelopment in a time- and cost-effective manner while also understanding and mitigating environmental risk.

As a recent success story, MMM’s Environmental Group recently obtained deletion of the former ~100-acre Koppers Co. Superfund Site (a former wood treating facility) from EPA’s National Priorities List. EPA designates a sub-set of Superfund sites that are highly impacted or complex for the National Priorities List (NPL), which can prevent entrance into state voluntary cleanup programs and exacerbate financing and marketability challenges. The former Koppers Superfund Site is part of an assemblage of properties compromising the 200-acre Magnolia redevelopment project, slated to be one of Charleston, South Carolina’s largest mixed-use developments. Koppers’ deletion from the NPL opened the door for transforming these formerly blighted and underutilized properties into a retail and residential hub along the Ashley River.

It is exciting to see other Superfund redevelopment projects taking shape throughout the country, including Concord City Council's recent designation of Brookfield as the master developer for the Concord Naval Weapons Station Project, a Superfund and NPL site.