What Is A Desktop Environmental Report & Should You Use It?

Various industries that people can work in nowadays have various types of requirements that need to be met in order for those people and their businesses to be considered successful. In certain cases, and especially when real estate is involved, there is a process called due diligence that needs to be done with the aim of ensuring that certain standards are met. For example, you need to check the property and the land for any contaminants that could harm the environment, because the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) has set certain standards that absolutely need to be met.

Here’s more on what the EPA does: https://www.investopedia.com/terms/e/environmental-protection-agency.asp

When talking about real estate and due diligence, we certainly cannot fail to mention one thing, called a desktop environment report. When you first hear about it, you might be slightly confused as to what the difference is between it and, say, the Phase I Environmental Site Assessment (ESA). Well, it is undeniably completely normal for you to be confused about this, especially if you don’t have much experience in these industries that have to deal with EPA and those important standards.

Yet, just because you might be a bit confused in the beginning, it does not mean that you should just leave things be and refuse to learn anything about this. After all, you will easily be able to find the information you need about the differences that might be confusing you and about the desktop environment report in the first place. If you don’t know which of these assessments is necessary for you, for the industry you are in and for the work you are doing, you will certainly need to find that out.

If you are ready to do some learning, then you are in for a treat today. This is because we are going to cover one specific topic and thus help you understand precisely whether that is the report type you need to get or not. In case you could not have guessed it, I am talking about the desktop environmental report. Click this if you want to find out more about due diligence first.

What Is This Report?

To put things as simply as possible, this is a type of due diligence that is done on real estate. Its scope is limited, so we can say that it is actually partial due diligence. It is also used to asses environmental risks, just like the ESAs mentioned above, but, as you might have concluded it all on your own, the range of assessment is a bit narrower. Yet, it can still be extremely useful for certain properties and industries, including the oil and gas industry.

As explained, the scope of this particular report is limited, but we cannot tell you precisely what it will include, because the scope is not set in stone. What does that precisely mean, though? Well, in short, the actual range of the assessment and the scope of the report will depend on the needs that the land developer will actually have. Even though every report will be different, though, there are some general components that you can expect all of those to include.

For starters, it will include environmental records and database review, which basically reviews the state and federal databases in search for information on contamination and other issues that might have been reported. In addition to that, it will also include historical records, as well as some custom items that the client might need. So, it will be customized to the client’s needs, but it will also include some common items.

Should You Use It?

You are now probably wondering why it is that you would use the desktop environment report instead of the ESA, for instance, given that its scope is narrower. I can definitely understand if this is what might be bothering you and if you might not understand the value of this specific report right now, but the truth is that it has its purpose and its value. In simple words, it is sometimes much better to use this one instead of the ESA and you are quickly going to understand why.

This particular report can help you discover any problems and contamination issues that might exist and even though it is of a rather limited scope, you can find it quite useful in certain industries. Sometimes, the ESA might simply not be required and you can easily find out everything you need to know by getting the desktop report, especially when we are talking about lands that are presumed to have low contamination risks. Its value also lies in the fact that the process will be completed more quickly. On top of all that, it will cost less, which is certainly another great benefit to consider.

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