Environmental Lawyer

An Environmental Lawyer’s Advice: Phase 1 ESAs

As an environmental consultant, we’re frequently asked for advice that veers out of our lane and into what environmental lawyers do best. While I’ve never meet or talked to the good people over at Spencer Fane, they seem to have some pretty good, concise, advice about environmental law. The following is gleaned from their website,

Cleanup Liabilities

Cleanup Liabilities: Phase I ESA Gone Awry Costs Millions

  I thought this article was great information that most people in a property transaction never hear about. You can read the whole thing by clicking here. Lenders, borrowers, purchasers, sellers, and even contractors sometimes get annoyed with environmental lawyers when we insist on reviewing Phase I Environmental Site Assessment (ESA) draft reports, looking at

Leaking underground storage tank LUST

Leaking Underground Storage Tank Removal & Closure

You have (or think you have) a leaking underground storage tank (UST). Maybe you’re about to buy or sell a property. Either way, you know it’s going to be a problem. The government doesn’t like underground tanks, it especially doesn’t like them leaking and it gets twitchy if the tank isn’t being currently used for

Marketing Scientific Services: Office Vibe

Office culture drives who arrives at your doorstep to be hired. If you want a place people want to come work, you have to be a place people want to come work. Below is our bosslady having fun on the electric scooters we bought to go to the local restaurants at lunch. It’s covid times

Marketing Scientific Services: Don’t Be Lame

My wife has been in the environmental consulting business for her whole career. There’s been a repeating pattern I watched her go through while working for other people. They take scientists and rightfully give them all the scientific work they can do. All the while, they do absolutely no marketing. Then, for whatever reason, their

Marketing Scientific Services: Embracing Your Inner Weirdo

I’m a big fan of being yourself even if being yourself is a little weird. Below is a video of the skeleton crew which was left after COVID struck in March, clowning around and vamping on the 40 year anniversary of the Breakfast Club movie. You might think something about you, the job you do

Marketing Scientific Services: How to Retain Talent

It’s hard to find and retain talent. Anyone who manages a business, or owns one could attest. The job we do is hard. Environmental Consulting is often hot, wet, loud, dry, dusty, cold, windy and dirty. Other times you’re grinding out reports in an office, using every bit of your knowledge but it’s silent and,

Metropolitan Water Reclamation District Thornton Quarry Well Project

The Golden Gate Bridge is an amazing structure. Massive, sitting across a fault line, beautiful and elegant in a way that complements nature and the surrounding city. The Hoover Dam is enormous too. It holds back mind-boggling volumes of water. It makes electricity. It was built with architectural style as well as engineering grace. Both

Commercial Lenders

2 Business Practices that Raise Environmental Risk for Commercial Lenders

Before we start we should get on the same page about why environmental consultants are hired by commercial lenders to begin with. An Environmental Consultant’s job is to limit downside risk on a commercial loan. Too often lending institutions business practices encourage environmental consultants to raise costs, increase environmental risk, or both. How can this

Freelance Environmental

Sample Phase 1 ESA Questionnaire for Freelance Environmental Consultants

The ESA Questionnaire is an important part of an ASTM 1527-13 Phase 1 ESA. A3E wants to help Freelance Environmental Consultants to do more work, faster and ultimately get paid more. Why? Because we’ve been there, done that. Let’s work together!

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