Voluntary Response Action Program (VRAP)

The Maine Legislature established the Voluntary Response Action Program (VRAP) in 1993. It is administered by the Bureau of Remediation and Waste Management of the Maine Department of Environmental Protection (DEP). DEP says the program lets applicants investigate and clean up properties to DEP's satisfaction in return for protection from DEP enforcement actions. DEP says any party, such as a lender, fiduciary, owner, operator or buyer, may submit environmental site assessments and voluntary response plans for review.

In a Phase I ESA

VRAP sites are the Maine form of the state voluntary cleanup records that ASTM E1527-21 lists as a standard source. The general reading of a voluntary cleanup listing is on the VCP page. Four Maine details shape how to read one.

• Check which letter the file holds. Where a remedial plan is approved, DEP issues a "No Action Assurance" letter saying no enforcement action will follow if the plan is properly carried out, and after a final report a "Certificate of Completion". Where the assessments show no need for cleanup, DEP's issue profile says it often issued a "No Further Action Assurance" letter before the fall of 2025, and now issues only a Certificate of Completion. An approved plan is not a finished cleanup: DEP says applicants are not required to complete the work.
• The release has limits. DEP says the release covers only the satisfactory remediation of all known contamination at the time the certificate is issued, and only relevant state law. It grants no protection under federal law or from third-party actions, and the applicant remains responsible for unknown contamination and later discharges. The certificate generally applies to the applicants, their successors and assigns, lenders, fiduciaries and financiers. A current owner or operator can receive liability protection only if all known releases at the property are removed or remediated.
• Controls are recorded at the registry of deeds. Any final VRAP certification that relies on institutional or engineering controls requires a Declaration of Environmental Covenant under the Uniform Environmental Covenants Act, 38 M.R.S. § 3001 et seq., recorded with the appropriate registry of deeds, and DEP says final certification documents must be recorded there. Search the registry for both. See Environmental Covenants.
• The file can hold earlier reports. DEP's application requirements, updated January 27, 2026, say a Phase I or Phase II that relies heavily on previous reports should include copies of them if they were not provided to DEP before, that Phase I assessments should be current and follow EPA's All Appropriate Inquiry rule and/or the current ASTM practice, and that the applicant must determine whether public or private water supplies lie within 2,500 feet of the site; where there is no public water, DEP asks only for the closest water supply in each direction. DEP's general guidance page for hazardous substance sites, as read, still names the 2013 edition of the ASTM Phase I practice.

DEP says properties operating under a license from a specific DEP program, or that may fall under another program's jurisdiction such as RCRA or Superfund, may not be eligible, and that DEP decides each site's eligibility. The application fee, as the requirements page states it on January 27, 2026, is 1% of the property's most recent assessed value, capped at $15,000, with no other VRAP fees. Brownfields Program sites usually take part in VRAP as well; see the Brownfields Program.

Where to look a site up

• DEP's VRAP page links the Division of Remediation Sites List, on the File Room, Reports and Lists page, as the public record of sites in the Division of Remediation, including all VRAP sites. DEP says that under its public communication matrix, effective January 1, 2008, all new VRAP sites will at a minimum be added to a publicly available database.
• DEP's GIS Maps and Other Data Files page maps VRAP sites under the Remediation Sites (Institutional Controls) Database.
• This handbook did not open the list or the map.

Getting the file

DEP's Administrative Record for remediation sites was on paper until February 2021. Converted files are in DEP's online remediation documents portal, linked from the File Room, Reports and Lists page, and paper VRAP files are reviewed at the file room by appointment, at (207) 287-7843. See File Room, Reports and Lists.

Sources

Maine Department of Environmental Protection pages, read October 13, 2026:

• Voluntary Response Action Program (VRAP), no modified date shown.
• DEP Issue Profile for VRAP, dated March 2018 at its head, with a later note on the fall of 2025.
• Application Submission Requirements, updated January 27, 2026.
• Remediation Program Guidance, no modified date shown.
• File Room, Reports, Scanned Documents and Lists, no modified date shown.
• GIS Maps & Other Data Files, no modified date shown.