All News Releases By Date

EPA Gives New Hampshire $1 Million For Fund to Help Develop State's Brownfield Sites

Release Date: 04/20/2001
Contact Information: Amy Miller, EPA Press Office (617-918-1042)

BOSTON - The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced today it will spend $7.5 million to help assess, clean and redevelop abandoned, contaminated sites throughout New England, including a $1 million grant to the state of New Hampshire.

EPA New England announced that $1 million will be spent for a revolving loan fund to the NH Department of Environmental Services (DES). This money will go into a revolving loan fund to help pay for site cleanups.

"These grants will bring additional momentum to community Brownfields programs all across New Hampshire," said Ira Leighton, acting regional administrator for EPA New England. "Dozens of contaminated sites across New England have already been restored through this successful program. Today's announcement ensures more successes down the road."

DES, which received $1.45 million in 1999, will get the additional $1 million for their existing Brownfields Cleanup Revolving Loan Fund (BCRLF) Pilot. DES plans to use these funds, in partnership with the N.H. Department of Resources and Economic Development, the City of Nashua, and the towns of Bradford, Greenfield and Newport, to provide low interest loans to clean up contaminated properties in these communities and throughout the state. DES is using its earlier funds in partnership with the N.H. Office of State Planning, the City of Concord and the towns of Durham and Londonderry.

Under the agency's Brownfields Assessment Program, communities receive funding to assess contamination at abandoned and vacant sites to determine the nature and extent of contamination, and to estimate the costs of cleaning up the sites for redevelopment. Communities also receive funding to establish revolving loan programs, allowing them to make low interest loans to developers for the cleanup of these sites. Once assessed and cleaned, these sites can be put back into productive use by the community. These grants bring to $4.8 million the amount EPA has spent to date on brownfields projects in New Hampshire.