Comments
I have not seen a specific relianace letter but they do have specific requirements as you indicated to your client. Depending on the type of FHA loan some of the other requirements can be significantly outside the standard scope. The MAP guide previously mentioned would be a good place to start and you can even refer your client to it. If they still insist on just a standard Phase I, I would put in writing to your client about the additional requirements typically associated with FHA loans so if the question comes up later you have it documented. Once you complete the Phase I you should send the the approval letter for their approval first and indicate that there will be an additional fee if you need to redo the Phase I with special requirements or a special form or relianace letter after the fact.I took it a couple of years ago. Review your old Geology text books to refresh on basic principles. Also when i took it they were reducing the focus on environmental and increasing the focus on engineering geology. there is some review material available at the ASBOG website and there are several reviews available, I use REG Review to review for the test which had a lot of review material which I found helpful.
We generally request the client to provide one or indicate that we will order one if they want to include it in the Phase I. We do not conduct it ourselves for the reasons discussed herein. If they want us to order it we charge an additional fee to cover ordering it and reviewing it. We also explain that they can take a couple of weeks to obtain and might not be ready by the time they need the report.
It is reasonable to assume there may have bee a UST. I would call it an REC. I would discuss with the client before making recommendations. A GPR or more detailed record review would be the best way, but would not necessarrily be conclusive.
This has been discussed a while and there is another post discussing a new licensing organization. Unfortunately until there is a formal license associated with EPs recognized in the regulations, I don't see any legitimate license for Environmental professionals.
I am a PG but an environmental certification would be a good thing. The most important part will be differentiating it from the many so called certifying organizations already out there, otherwise it will just be another organization in the crowd. I think it will be difficult to really get it to stand out from the crowd and be accepted and looked for by people outside the industry with so many organizations already out there even though most of them do not really mean anything.
I think the items mentioned here would be good. Heating oil tanks for heating kilns. Probably not the glazes as if they were doing bricks they usually don't coat them. The fill of the former clay pit. Assuming they did the clay mining on site which is likely, some of the same things you see with the current mining operations, they may have used some of the same facilities. They likely had the rail line for the brickplant as well.
I agree that it comes down to objectives. Sometimes the client just wants to know if there is contamination at 1 or 2 RECs that were identified in a Phase I, in which case a couple of soil borings could be sufficient to allow them to decide whether to proceed with pursuing the property. If they want a more detailed evaluation of all the RECs and groundwater the cost will go up. Often it is difficult for the client to understand this and it must be explained to them. I have had clients tell me their budget for the Phase II and tell me that is al they can afford. or have had legal teams adjust the recommended scope. I always explain the limitations, and if they still want to proceed we include those limitations in the Phase II report and call it a limited Phase II.
I have had clients whom don't understand the process who thought Phase I includes Phase II sampling and geotech, or who have said just do what needs to be done with no understanding of what they need and have no concept of the cost and can not understand why it would cost so much when it previously cost less, not realizing the scope differences or even knowing what the scope was before compared to this one just assuming all Phase IIs are the same just like a title search or other fee that is part of a property transaction. In this case I try to educate them of the differences, unfortunately some clients have a hard time understanding this or the differences between Phase IIs.
I did a lot of work in NYC where we were near incinerator sites. They commonly filled low lying areas nearby the incinerators with slag (metals & SVOCs would be the contaminants of concern. However I would not call it a REC, huge area of NYC were filled in with this slag, there are papers on historic fill material in NYC that you can refer to. I would call it a business risk. and indicate as long as they are not planning to excavate and are connected to city water (which is mandatory in NYC due to groundwater quality) it is not a REC.
Tom hit it on the head. The requirement depends upon the state. Generally it is the property owner, and we usually indicate in our reports that they should be notified. However if the state has a licensing program licensed professionals are often required to notify the state if the client does not. Many states have a time limit to notify them after the contamaintion is discovered.