Environment

• For the O’Neill Property Group we handled three very significant projects totaling over $500 million:
  • Weyerhaeuser Residential and Marina Resort.  This 156-unit high-end residential complex and equestrian center, along with a 100+-boat marina, in Portsmouth, Rhode Island, was a redevelopment of a former heavy industrial site and farm.  The environmental issues ranged from hazardous waste removal and remediation to land planning and innovative coastal regulatory change. The multiyear permitting of the project was shortened and the life of the project itself saved by our ability to work with various federal and state  regulatory agencies and a local university to create a unique land-use approach, rehabilitating the distressed area into a world-class resort community.

• Hood/Melville 1,500 slip Marina and Residential Resort and Destination.  This 998-residential-unit and 1,500-slip marina is the largest on the East Coast of the United States.  It involves the rehabilitation of a former Navy facility with many challenges, including hazardous waste and Naval waste remediation, siting of unique and state-of-the-art wave and storm protection structures for the marina, and redesign and coordination of existing state regulations.  AP&S worked on every phase of the permitting and design, and continues to assist the client and project team.

• Carnegie Residences and Tower.  This high-end resort and residential community is situated between the Hood Marina and Weyerhaeuser development, completing the development of these three coastal projects.  This project consists of 30+ stand-alone multimillion-dollar coastal homes along with a 21-story condo tower, which is a rehabilitated commercial structure (the former Kaiser Aluminum plant). The community also has a 41-slip marina for its residents.  This completed project has been the focus of AP&S permitting and planning efforts for the past five years and demonstrates our ability to work within a very complex regulatory and planning scenario and bring a large-scale coastal project to completion in very short timeframe.

• Essex  River Venture Richmond Sq.  This 30+ unit Brownfield residential rehabilitation project is the very first to be permitted under a pioneering urban coastal greenway regulatory scheme.  AP&S guided this project through several state and federal programs from Brownfield Rehab and tax credits through zoning and siting under these new regulations.

• Pro-Active Environmental Compliance.  The AP&S Environmental Group is engaged with a large national retail chain and other environmental attorneys throughout the U.S. to develop a nationwide program to identify special regulatory handling requirements for the disposal and recycling of the retail's consumer products in each state.  This first-of-a-kind approach by an environmentally proactive client will allow store associates to scan each of the 500,000+ products found on the store shelves to determine proper disposal and handling of each product under state hazardous and solid-waste laws, in the event the product needs to be disposed of or recycled due to spills, leaks, returns and other events. 

• Touret v. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).  AP&S successfully defended Brown  University as one of the defendants in an appeal brought by neighbors under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) seeking to reverse NASA and Department of Energy grants for a new $90 million life-sciences building.  We argued that the building was not a “major federal action” within NEPA’s scope, and the court agreed.  

• Unilever Bestfoods and KIK Custom Products, Inc. v. Teknor Apex et al.  AP&S represents plaintiff Unilever Bestfoods in its attempt to recover expenditures in connection with contamination at Rhode Island Superfund site.  Since 2001 the plaintiffs have successfully settled with more than 30 defendants and are proceeding with litigation against remaining non-settlers. 

• Rhode Island Resource Recovery Corporation (RIRRC) v. Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management (RIDEM).  We represented the RIRRC in a landfill permitting dispute with the RIDEM involving jurisdiction.  The court granted partial summary judgment for our client, ruling that the RIDEM could not require the RIRRC to obtain a state permit for remediation conducted entirely on site.