The first stage of an environmental land assessment should include the consideration of the activities, industries and land uses that are occurring or may have historically occurred on the land, or adjacent land, and whether they may have caused pollutants to enter land or groundwater resulting in contamination.
Potentially contaminating activities, industries and land uses include, but are not limited to:
- Acid / alkali plant and formulation
- Ammunition manufacture and usage (e.g. shooting ranges)
- Asbestos production, handling or disposal
- Asphalt/bitumen manufacturing
- Commercial engine and machinery repair sites
- Battery manufacturing or recycling
- Boat/ship building, marinas, slip ways and associated boat yards
- Boiler or kiln usage
- Chemical manufacture and formulation (e.g. fertilisers, paints, pesticides, photography, plastics, solvents)
- Drum conditioning works
- Dry cleaning establishments
- Electrical transformers
- Ethanol production plant
- Explosives industries
- Fertiliser manufacturing plants
- Fill material imported onto a site from a potentially contaminated source
- Foundry Operations
- Gas works
- Herbicide manufacture
- Sites of incidents involving release of hazardous materials
- Industrial activities involving hazardous chemicals in significant quantities
- Iron and steel works
- Landfill sites, including on-site waste disposal and refuse pits
- Metal treatments (e.g. electroplating) and abrasive blasting
- Metal smelting, refining or finishing
- Mineral processing
- Mine sites involving waste rock or tailings deposits
- Oil or gas production or refining
- Paint formulation and manufacture
- Pesticide manufacture and formulation sites
- Petroleum product or oil storage
- Pharmaceutical manufacture and formulation - including illicit laboratories
- Power stations
- Printing
- Radio-active material usage (e.g. hospitals)
- Railway yards
- Scrap yards and recycling facilities
- Sewage treatment plant
- Sheep and cattle dips
- Sites of fires involving hazardous materials, including fire fighting foam use
- Spray storage and mixing sites (e.g. for orchards)
- Spray painting industries
- Tanning and associated trades
- Textile operations
- Tyre manufacturing and retreading works
- Wood preservation and storage or cutting of treated timber
Wool scouring