Brownfield Redevelopment Specialist

Factories are a lot like flowers: Flowers need sunlight, soil, and water, and factories need money and upkeep. Without nourishment, both the flower and the factory dry up and die. Unfortunately, there’s one major difference: While a dead flower returns to the soil as food for other flowers, a factory just sits there, barren, blighted, and brown, bruising the land around it.

A dead factory is known as a “brownfield,” and it’s the job of a Brownfield Redevelopment Specialist to give the land on which it sits new life by revitalizing and repurposing it.

Sometimes known as a Remediation Project Manager, a Brownfield Redevelopment Specialist is typically employed by construction companies, engineering firms, developers, land institutes, and environmental consultancies. When you’re a Brownfield Redevelopment Specialist, all of these employers pay you to oversee the planning and execution of brownfield remediation projects involving the cleanup and containment of abandoned and polluted industrial properties.

On a daily basis, this translates into several routine tasks: First, you evaluate the costs and benefits of proposed remediation. Second, you conduct site assessments, then create plans, schedules, and budgets. Third, you hire and supervise the subcontractors and technical Consultants who implement remediation plans, such as Hydrologists, GIS Technicians, and Environmental Engineers. Finally, you coordinate remediation activities, and deliver progress reports and results to clients and stakeholders.

The typical brownfield redevelopment project requires demolishing structures, removing debris, and disposing of hazardous waste, then improving air, soil, and water quality before implementing plans for replanting and rebuilding. As the Brownfield Redevelopment Specialist, you’re in charge of it all, the result of which is a site that’s healthier for both people and the planet.