Contaminated Soil

As one of the nation’s leading environmental remediation companies, Clean Earth processes almost four million tons of soil per year. With over 25 years of experience treating and recycling contaminated soil for beneficial reuses including construction fill and brownfield reclamation, Clean Earth has a longstanding legacy of environmental responsibility and stewardship.

Soils are contaminated when harmful chemicals accumulate on a piece of land. Typically because of previous industrial or agricultural activities, it reaches a point where they become or have the potential to become dangerous to people or other organisms in the surrounding natural environment. The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that tens of thousands of contaminated sites remain in the United States that have the potential to cause environmental harm. Clean Earth plays an integral part in the process of remediating and reclaiming these lands for future productive uses.

Clean Earth has a number of state of the art treatment technologies for processing contaminated soil using thermal desorption, bioremediation, chemical fixation, and various physical segregation treatments. This allows us to accept and process a wide range of contaminated soils, including:

• Non-Hazardous - such as petroleum impacted, metal impacted, and soils from the excavation of underground storage tanks
• Hazardous
• RCRA categorized soils
• PCB - both TSCA and non-TSCA contaminated soils
• MGP - coal tar contaminated soil

MGP (Manufactured Gas Plants) - Coal Tar Contaminated Soil

For decades, remediating manufactured gas plant (MGP) sites has been a priority for some state environmental agencies and utility companies, due to potential public health impacts and financial liabilities that accompany former MGP sites.  Coal tar, a by-product of coal gas manufacturing contains a variety of organic compounds including polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH’s), benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylene (BTEX).   

Since the late 1980’s, thermal treatment has been an effective solution for solids that are contaminated with hydrocarbon fuels, petroleum solvents, coal tar, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB’s < 50ppm), lubricating oil, and industrial oils.  In some cases, thermal treatment is the “best” method because it destroys the regulated chemical contaminants, eliminating future liabilities for the generator. 

When the choice is made to send impacted soil media for thermal treatment, removal and destruction of the MGP-related organic compounds through thermal treatment is the key. The permit-defined treatment standards hold the facility to these requirements. Contractual agreements that require treatment to beneficial reuse standards is encouraged to fully limit landfilling, and thus, minimize or eliminate long-term liability.

Clean Earth’s expertise and experience recycling soil affords our clients unsurpassed service and value. Our full service approach means that we’re there when you need us every step of the process from soil testing to transportation, and ultimately developing a beneficial reuse or recycling plan customized for your materials. We’ll work with your team to make your project as cost-effective as possible while handling your material in compliance with state and federal environmental laws. Talk to our experts today about how to best approach your environmental remediation needs.