KMK Law Real Estate Blog

Ohio EPA will award $10 million by May 2012 and another $10 million by fall 2012 to private and public sector entities for clean diesel projects.  Funded by the Federal Highway Administration, the grants are targeted to improve air quality and public health in areas of Ohio not currently meeting air quality standards by reducing diesel exhaust emissions, upgrading diesel fleets and promoting the use of alternative and cleaner burning fuels.  The funds can be used for transit and school  buses, snow plows, refuse collection trucks, long and short haul trucks, locomotives and highway construction equipment.

To anyone planning soon to proceed with a brownfield environmental site assessment or an underground storage tank (UST) environmental site investigation in Hamilton County, Ohio this Legal Alert will be of interest.   

In a decision that will affect many businesses with small emission sources, on February 2, 2010, a federal district magistrate for the U.S. District Court, in Sierra Club v. Christopher Korleski, Case No. 2:08-CV-865 (U.S. District Court, Ohio), ruled that Ohio’s New Source Review (NSR) exemption for minor emission sources was invalid.

On February 10, 2010, the Cincinnati City Counsel approved an ordinance to formally delay the effective date of the City’s new environmental justice ordinance until February 1, 2011.  Implementation and enforcement of the ordinance was delayed due to a lack of funding.  The ordinance will require new or expanding manufacturing facilities to obtain an environmental justice permit.

As of December 21, 2009, it will become more difficult to build a new manufacturing facility or expand an existing one in the City of Cincinnati.  The law which will take effect is the Cincinnati Environmental Justice Ordinance and is believed to be the only one of its kind in the United States.