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Vermont

Residential heating oil tanks

Agency Vermont Department of Environmental Conservation

The storage tank pages of the Vermont Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) include a Financial Assistance Program for Residential Heating Oil Tank Removal/Replacement, paid from the Petroleum Cleanup Fund (PCF), and the program's pages say how DEC sorts a home's heating oil tanks. DEC says most aboveground tanks in Vermont are home heating tanks.

In a Phase I ESA

ASTM E1527-21 does not name heating oil tank records among its standard record sources. On a home, DEC's pages matter because they say when a buried heating oil tank has to come out and what paper a tank job can leave behind.

  • Buried or in the basement. For the program, DEC calls a tank underground when it holds #2 fuel oil and is buried on the property, and says a tank in the basement is regulated as an aboveground tank. An aboveground tank is any tank other than a buried one that holds heating fuel, by which DEC means #2 oil or kerosene.
  • A buried tank in use may stay. DEC says residential underground tanks that heat the home are not required to be removed. A tank out of service for more than one year must be removed unless removal is not an option, as where a structure stands over it, and closing it in place is then allowed. Ask whether a buried tank still heats the home and, if it does not, since when, and for the record of any closure in place.
  • Aboveground home tanks require inspections; certain deficiencies trigger tags. The inspection schedule and the red and yellow tags are on the Aboveground storage tanks page. Among the standards whose failure means the inspector must designate a tank noncompliant, DEC says buried fuel lines and tank piping must be coated or sleeved against corrosion, and that for tanks installed after August 1, 2024, every line or pipe touching soil or concrete must be both coated and sleeved against corrosion and crushing. DEC says tanks installed before that date have looser installation standards, with several phased in by July 1, 2030. Note how the fuel line reaches the burner.
  • Taking out an idle aboveground tank. DEC says removing an out-of-service aboveground system carries its own inspection requirement, for which no checklist is needed, and that contamination found or suspected during a tank removal goes to the Agency's Spill Response Program, reached through Spill Management.
  • Taking out a buried tank. DEC's UST removal page links a closure form for closing or removing a tank and its piping, and a brochure on removing a residential underground tank, which this handbook did not open. It says environmental consultants can carry out release assessments during a removal or closure, and sends questions about contamination found then to the Sites Management Section; see Underground storage tanks and Contaminated sites.

What the record shows

DEC says PCF assistance may be available to owners of single family homes, mobile homes included, whose underground or aboveground tanks serve only to heat the premises. The money is for low income homeowners to close, replace or upgrade the tank, or to switch the heating system to advanced wood heat or a heat pump. Spending is capped at $500,000 a fiscal year, and DEC says environmental risk and household income are the two main grounds for allocating it, as 10 V.S.A. ยง 1941(h) sets out. The program's steps leave paper with DEC.

  • Buried tanks. DEC must approve an application before any work starts, and work done before removal is not funded. Applicants for the fiscal year receive written notice, after July 1, of whether they are funded.
  • Aboveground tanks. DEC's page lists who may apply: the owner of a single family home in Vermont who lives there year round, with the tax bill in their name, whose tank heats that home, whose income for the previous year was under $75,000, and whose tank work is not yet done. A selected applicant gets a dated approval letter from DEC giving the amount and how long the award lasts. After the work, a certified tank inspector completes an inspection checklist, and the applicant sends DEC the invoice, the checklist and a direct payment form; the check then goes straight to the contractor. An applicant who is not selected gets a denial letter.

Ask the owner whether a tank was removed, closed or replaced with DEC's help. If it was, ask DEC for the approval letter and the completion paperwork.

Where to look a site up

Getting the file

The pages read give no records route of their own for the program. DEC's pages link the Agency of Natural Resources' public records route in their footer; see Public Records Requests.

Sources

Vermont Department of Environmental Conservation pages, read October 17, 2026, no modified date shown:

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