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Posted to uk.d-i-y
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Contaminated Land
Andy Hall wrote:
On 2007-07-30 19:14:11 +0100, (Andrew
Gabriel) said:
In article ,
"Andrew Mawson" writes:
Has anyone on list had experience of contractors decontaminating
land? We are buying a parcel of land, part of which was once used
as a coal yard, so there is the odd bit of coal still lying
arround, not much but definately some. Planning permission has been
granted for a barn conversion, but is conditional on a
contamination survey, ( inc soil, soil gas, surface and ground
water sampling) the be carried out by 'a suitably qualified and
accredited consultant/contractor..' At the end of the day it is
only a few bits of coal, maybe a few hundredweight spread over an
acre or so, but somthing is going to have to be sacrified to the
local planning gods and some form of decontamination process
carried out.
If you buy the land, you become legally responsible
for decontaminating it, which you have to do.
Sainsbury's bought a large plot in Wheathamstead (Herts)
for a superstore, on which they didn't get planning permission.
Then it was discovered to be contaminated (was the development
site for Murphy's Chemicals in the 1950's and 1960's).
Sainsbury's then had to fork out 10 times the cost of the land
to have it decontaminated. Half of it now has a housing estate
on it (I bet they don't have too many problems with insects and
slugs in their vegetable patches;-), and the other half has got
to run as reed bed for 25 years (at least) to continue the
decontamination.
At the public exhibition, I heard one of the Sainsbury's staff
say the person who bought the land for Sainsbury's and believed
it to have been decontanimated without having it thoroughly
tested first was fired.
Supermarkets don't seem to have much luck in that area, what with
Tescos falling onto the Marylebone main line.
You might be right about the luck aspect, but Morrison has been darned
cute at siting stores on brownfield sites.
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