Maine

Home Heating Oil Tanks

Agency Maine Department of Environmental Protection

The Maine Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) keeps a set of pages on home heating oil tanks. Staff of its Aboveground Oil Storage Tank Program run the technical side of its home heating oil tank spill prevention work. DEP puts the number of home heating oil tanks in Maine at about 400,000 and says that, on average, it answers 1.5 spills a day from those tanks alone; the page gives no date for either figure.

In a Phase I ESA

ASTM E1527-21 does not name heating oil tank records among its standard record sources. DEP's pages deal mostly with aboveground home tanks: what a spill from one sets in motion, and which tanks are likeliest to leak. Six points bear on a records review and a site visit.

A spill brings DEP to the property. DEP's FAQ says a tank owner who finds a leak or spill is responsible for calling its 24-hour line, (800) 482-0777, and that a first phone report should come as soon as possible and within two hours. Once the report is made, it says, a DEP responder is sent to assess the spill, clean it up and start remediation if needed. Search DEP's spill records for the address; see Hazardous & Oil Spill System (HOSS).
A basement tank still reaches soil and air. DEP says a leak can contaminate soil even where the tank stands on a concrete pad or in a basement, and can soak into walls and slabs and become a lasting source of vapors in the building. It says a spill within 300 feet of the home's own well or a neighbor's, or within 1,000 feet of a public water supply, may put that drinking water at risk.
The Fund helps aboveground tank owners. DEP says help is available through the Ground and Surface Waters Clean-Up and Response Fund to every owner of an aboveground oil storage tank whose spill or leak affects the environment. How a claim works, and who decides it, is on the Ground and Surface Waters Clean-up and Response Fund page.
Tanks near community wells. DEP says that as of July 1, 2009, a new or replacement home heating oil tank placed in a community water well's wellhead protection zone has to be double-walled or set in secondary containment. The same page adds that a double-walled tank or containment put in such a zone must be listed by a nationally recognized independent testing laboratory, and that a home tank there must be installed by someone the Oil and Solid Fuel Board licenses: a journeyman or master oil burner technician, or for an outside tank serving manufactured housing, a mobile home mechanic. The zone reaches 1,000 feet from the well or, where larger, covers the well's source water protection area as mapped by the Department of Health and Human Services. Where a home sits in such a zone, check whether a tank installed since that date meets the rule. To learn whether a building is in a zone, DEP says to call the Maine Drinking Water Program at 287-2070 and the local water district.
Buried fuel lines. DEP says an oil line buried in a basement floor with no sleeve must be replaced, and counts piping buried in the ground, in concrete or under a basement floor without continuous sleeving among the signs that a tank may leak. Note where the line runs from the tank to the burner.
Age and condition. DEP gives 25 years as the design life of a heating oil tank and says most tank failures are in tanks that old or older. DEP names corrosion, usually working outward from inside the tank, as the main cause of heating oil tank spills at single family homes. It says crimped tank ends usually point to a tank made in 1999 or earlier, because a July 1999 update to the UL 80 standard stopped approving that weld. DEP's list of warning signs also takes in a tank out of use that still holds oil, a fill pipe left behind for a tank that is gone, oil fed from a 55-gallon drum or another container that lacks a listing for heating appliances, and stains or drips at the fill pipe, filter, valves or gauge. Record any of these on the site visit and ask the owner about them.

For buried heating oil tanks the pages read say little. DEP's underground tank forms include a groundwater monitoring well log that it keeps for consumptive use heating oil tanks with a single wall, and the pages read do not say which buried heating oil tanks DEP registers. Check the tank search on the Underground Oil Storage Tanks (UST) page.

DEP also offers two kinds of help with replacement. It provides grants, through the state's nine Community Action Agencies, to income-eligible Maine residents who own their home and have a high-risk tank, and says propane is partly covered as a replacement fuel. Through its Home Heating Oil Equipment Replacement Project, Maine homeowners with deficient tank equipment at risk of a spill may qualify for up to $500 toward fuel lines, vent whistles, gauges, filter protectors, filters and similar parts. There is no income limit, but DEP asks homeowners to verify eligibility. The pages read do not say what record a grant or a replacement leaves, so ask the owner whether a tank was replaced through either one.

Where to look a site up

DEP's spill records, searched as the HOSS page describes.
DEP's registered tank search, described on the Underground Oil Storage Tanks (UST) page.
The pages read link no list of home heating oil tanks, of tanks replaced with a grant, or of tanks inside wellhead protection zones. They give a staff member's line for questions; for a spill, DEP's 24-hour line is (800) 482-0777.

Getting the file

For a home tank spill, ask for DEP's spill file. Its scanned spill reports and its file room are described on the File Room, Reports and Lists page; have the spill number when you ask.

Sources

Maine Department of Environmental Protection pages, read October 17, 2026, no modified date shown: