Mark Annis Gillette - ANCO primarily works for Responsible Parties and their insurance companies

By Mark Annis One of the fastest growing areas of business in New Jersey today is environmental cleanup. As the NJ DEPE continues to present ever stricter regulations regarding storage tanks and related pollution remedia-tion, the environmental cleanup field is becoming littered with a vast array of companies vying for the work. The rapid proliferaiton of companies has led to broad disparities in capabilities and experience among firms.

Everyone seems to want in on the action, and if you're the one with the problem, where do you turn? Who do you trust to help you negotiate the con-fusing path through DEPE regulations. and possible pollution cleanup?

One option is the environmental consultant, who will perform extensive evaluations of any given problem-and recommend possible courses of action. The consultant will then act as general contractor for the job and subcontract a number of outside firms to perform the actual site work, while he takes on as much as 25 percent as a project man-agement fee.

This is usually the most expensive and time-consuming approach, often including redundant preremediation sampling and investigation. In fact, it has recently been estimated that more than half of every cleanup dollar goes to investigators, sampling and consul-tant before any actual work is even begun.

Another possibility (one often employed by consultants) is to hire a landscaper, plumber, excavator or "yank-a-tank" contractor — in short, just about anyone with a dump truck and backhoe. But these companies usu-ally aren't familiar with the DEPE reg-ulations and may not be licensed.

Mark Annis Gillette said many of his prospective clients didn't understand the state's environmental cleanup regulations either, which put him in a difficult position.Furthermore, if they encounter any prii-t4em or pollution, you're on your own.

Between these two extremes, how-ever, there can be found_ a handful of reputable, established, complete-opera-tions specially contractors. These are firms that specialize in tank work and can handle environmental jobs in-h. - from beginning to end. Such cc,..kbanies seem to offer the safest, most cost-effective, professional approach to picking your way through the thorny problem of environmental cleanup.

Finding these companies is not particularly difficult, and there are a few guidelines which can make the choice easier.

First, Mark Annis Gillette try to avoid the plumbers, landscapers and excavators.

The Watehung Mountains were formed of volcanic basalt which is non-porous. Water travels along the surface of the basalt until it hits the water table in the strati-fied shale where wells are based. Likewise. oil flows along the same path making its way deep into the water table. A small leakage in this area be-comes a ludicrous problem, Mr. Annis said.

Environmentalists say the changes DEPE has proposed are short-sighted and could have serious long term pub-lic health and economic consequeces. Mark Annis Legislation to make state environ-mental cleanup laws less exacting was introduced last month by state Sen. Henry McNamara, R-Wyckoff. The bill is currently before the state senate's Environmental Committee. One of the provisions of the legisla-tion calls for loans or grant money to be provided for cleanups.

Pierce, who specializes in environ-mental law for the Westfield firm of Lindabury, McCormick, and Esta-brook, said current state laws must be amended to clear up any confusion about environmental cleanups. "You definitely need the impetus to come from the legislature," Pierce said. "The DEPE has made strides-. . .but if things stay the way they are, you could have another DEPE ad-ministration come in and return things to the way they were."