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Contaminants of Concerns
The contaminants of concerns on used sites
depend on the previous uses (industrial activities) that took place at the
site. The contaminants released to a site that was used as a gas station
will be different from those released unto a site where mining activities or
ore processing took place.
The broad category of contaminants that could
be found on most contaminated sites include:
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Dilapidating Infrastructure - buildings,
equipments, and other structures
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Hazardous chemicals/wastes
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Surface Debris /
non-hazardous wastes
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Contaminated Soils -
metals impacted soils; petroleum hydrocarbon (PHC) impacted soils or
polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) impacted soils
Dilapidating Infrastructure - buildings,
equipments, and other structures:
Abandoned buildings and
other infrastructures in states of disrepair, pose danger to human and
animals.
The buildings sometimes contain
Hazardous chemicals/wastes that are either toxic, radioactive and
dangerous (e.g. explosive or with the high potential of causing fire),
injurious to human and animal health (e.g. cancerous etc).
Old structures, mostly pre-1970 built
buildings and infrastructures contain asbestos, lead amended
paints and/or polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) amended paints.
Asbestos, lead and PCB components of the paint pose continuous hazard to
human and the ecology.
Abandoned dilapidating
building buildings are sources of non-hazardous wastes and debris
posing physical hazards on old sites.
Contaminated Soils:
Used and abandoned sites
contain soils contaminated by petroleum hydrocarbons. These would
have resulted from spills and leaks of gasoline, kerosene, fuels, diesels,
lubricating oils and similar products during the years of industrial
activities at the site.
Some soils at old sites also get
contaminated by PCB, and metals such as Zinc, lead, cadmium.
Other features of used sites:
Other features of used sites requiring
site clean up relates to specific sites such as mining and exploration
sites. Such sites contain mine openings (adits, vent raises and exploration
trenches), Tailings/tailings pond, waste rocks that may or may not be acid
generating. These features pose physical hazards and chemical hazards to
humans and ecology.
Site cleanup technologies
reduce the contaminant levels or the levels of risks on used sites to levels
pre-specified, by regional standards or site specific studies, as protective
of humans and ecology.
Follow the links to the left for
introductory information on Environmental Site Clean up including sections
features on contaminated sites, common chemical contaminants, and the remediation technologies for reducing the common
contaminants.
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