Innocent until Proven Guilty:
U.S. EPA’s Petroleum Vapor Intrusion Technical Guide
Lenny Siegel
August, 2015 Draft
On June 11, 2015, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency released its 3.0 MB PDF Technical Guide for Addressing Petroleum Vapor Intrusion at Leaking Underground Storage Tank Sites, along with its companion 3.2 MB PDF OSWER Technical Guide for Assessing and Mitigating the Vapor Intrusion Pathway from Subsurface Vapor Sources to Indoor Air. Go to http://www.epa.gov/oswer/vaporintrusion/guidance.html#EO12866OSWERVI to download both document. In addition, the Petroleum Guide may be found, along with supporting technical documents, at http://www.epa.gov/oust/cat/pvi/.
The Petroleum Guide, as its full title suggests, addresses a narrow but common type of vapor intrusion problem, where there is suspicion that petroleum hydrocarbons (PHCs) and non-petroleum fuel additives that have been released from leaking regulated underground storage tanks will form vapors that migrate into overlying buildings. A large fraction of the nation’s 571,000 underground storage tanks, primarily at gasoline stations, have experienced leaks or spills. The Petroleum Guide is designed for the regulated underground storage tank universe. It is not designed for sites where the principal contaminants are chlorinated volatile organic compounds such as trichloroethylene (TCE) or tetrachloroethylene (PCE). Nor does it apply to large petroleum release sites such as refineries and pipelines. For those, consult the other, more general Technical Guide. On the other hand, Petroleum Guide is expected to provide useful guidance in the remediation and reuse of petroleum-contaminated brownfields.
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For the entire 8-page, 3.4 MB summary, go to http://www.cpeo.org/pubs/PVISummary.pdf --
Lenny Siegel
Executive Director, Center for Public Environmental Oversight
a project of the Pacific Studies Center
278-A Hope Street
Mountain View, CA 94041
Voice: 650-961-8918 or 650-969-1545
Fax: 650-961-8918
LSiegel@cpeo.org
http://www.cpeo.org
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