What Are the Tasks Conducted By Environmental Auditors During a Phase 1 Site Assessment?

Environmental impact study is the major activity that is done during a phase 1 site assessment. This activity mainly involves inspecting a site or property in order to know whether the place is causing any kind of negative impact on the environment or not. However, this study is an umbrella term covering several processes and tasks done by environmental auditors. Hence, if you want an inspection in your site then you must know about the processes conducted in a phase 1 site assessment.

Knowing about such processes can help you to prepare yourself for a site inspection with the right kind of information or documentation needed. Hence, here are the tasks that are done by most environmental auditors and consultants when they check your site.

Processes Done During a Phase 1 Inspection

1. Reviewing Records

An environmental auditor first reviews all the documents related to a certain site. The purpose of this is to know if the site is legal or not and complies with all environmental regulations. For example, a property or project site in the USA might need to have approvals from the government in the form of documentation if it follows regulations like the Clean Water Act. An auditor will need to review the documents and see if a site does not have any of the approvals that are necessary, if there are more than one needed. 

2. Site Inspection

Environmental consultants need to take a tour of a site and its surroundings. They do this in order to spot anything that might cause damage to the environment. For example, a property can have things such as leaking oil containers or too much asbestos dust or even too many cut-down trees around it. Instances like these can cause environmental consultants to know if a property needs some form of amendment in order to make it more eco-friendly.

3. Conducting Interviews With Owners

One of the major processes conducted in a phase 1 site assessment is interviews with owners. Owners in this case can include a property owner or even the previous owners who occupied it. In case of engineering or construction projects, environmental consultants can question project managers and business owners who have initiated the project. 

These questions can involve what environmental concerns the owners or project managers have in mind when it comes to maintaining the site. The auditors can also inspect the site in question in order to see if all the concerns that they questioned about are being met or not. 

4. Preparing Final Reports

This is the final task for a phase 1 ESA program. This involves an environmental auditor to prepare the final report as a result of their inspection. The report contains information as to whether a project is complying with all environmental regulations in a country and to what extent. It can also contain information about lingering problems in a site that might be a threat to the environment. The auditor addresses all of these problems and recommends the site owner or current user to fix the problems as quickly as possible.

Bottom Line

It will be helpful if you as a site owner or project manager know about the processes conducted in a phase 1 site assessment from an environmental consultant directly. This can help you to prepare yourself for a phase 1 environmental site assessment by knowing what your site requires in order to be deemed as eco-friendly. In fact, knowing about the processes conducted can also help you to cooperate with environmental inspection agents to know if your site needs amendments or not.