Oregon
Brownfields Program
Oregon Brownfields Program
The Brownfields Program of the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) provides technical assistance and other services to parties investigating, cleaning up and planning the reuse of brownfields. DEQ says a brownfield is generally defined in federal and state law as real property where expansion or redevelopment is complicated by the actual, potential, or perceived presence of environmental contamination.
In a Phase I ESA
ASTM E1527-21 lists state brownfields sites as a standard source, and the general reading of a brownfields listing is on the Brownfields page. Five Oregon details shape how to read one.
- DEQ's brownfields are sites it has helped. DEQ describes its lists as the sites it considers brownfields, meaning sites that have received financial or technical assistance. The label records assistance. The page read does not tie it to any level of contamination.
- The list is a filter on the cleanup database. DEQ's instruction is to go to its Environmental Cleanup Site Information query page, choose the search of the complete database, tick the box labeled "Return only Current or Former Brownfield Sites" and submit. That instruction points at the historic database, which DEQ's Environmental Cleanup Program page says has been retired and contains stale data. The pages read do not give the matching step in Your DEQ Online. See the Environmental Cleanup Site Information database page.
- DEQ may already have assessed the site. DEQ performs Site-Specific Assessments, including Phase I Environmental Site Assessments, funded by EPA. It says such an assessment generates detailed information on environmental conditions at a site and gives recommendations and cost estimates for cleanup as needed. Ask whether one exists before starting from nothing.
- An assessment is advisory. DEQ says it addresses concerns about an assessed site in an advisory capacity, and that neither DEQ nor EPA will require additional action unless the assessment documents an imminent threat to human health or the environment.
- Old mill sites have their own inventory. DEQ says it partners with other Oregon state agencies on Oregon's Collective Impact Mills Project, which provides a centralized searchable inventory and map of over 500 abandoned or diminished wood-product mill sites. DEQ calls them a significant subset of Oregon's brownfield sites.
The assessments have eligibility rules. Applicants are public entities, non-profit and community development organizations, and quasi-public organizations such as port authorities. A private owner cannot apply directly, but may find an appropriate local government to apply on its behalf. The assessment is free to public-sector and non-profit owners that are not responsible for the site contamination. A privately held site must have a local-government sponsor, and the private owner must agree to help offset the cost.
DEQ also names two other state bodies. It says Business Oregon provides low-interest loans and grants for assessments, cleanups and redevelopment planning, and also provides a database of Oregon brownfield sites and buildings, which DEQ calls comprehensive. It says the Oregon Health Authority has a Brownfield Initiative. Their pages were not read for this handbook.
Where to look a site up
- DEQ's Environmental Cleanup Information Database page, which carries the historic database search that DEQ's brownfields instruction uses.
- For current status, the Your DEQ Online Public Records Portal.
- DEQ's Brownfields page links a PDF on the mills project. The page read does not link the inventory itself.
- The Brownfields Program is at brownfieldinfo@deq.oregon.gov and 503-229-5696.
Getting the file
Ask for the Site-Specific Assessment report and any cleanup record that followed it. The route is described on the Your DEQ Online and public records requests page.
Sources
Oregon Department of Environmental Quality pages, read October 7, 2026, no modified date shown: