WVDEP Application Enhancer (AE)

Application Enhancer (AE) is the searchable online document database of the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection (WVDEP). WVDEP says it has made most of its files available to the public through it. What is not there is asked for under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), and this page covers both routes.

In a Phase I ESA

ASTM E1527-21 does not name an agency's document system among its standard record sources. It is where the reports and letters behind a West Virginia listing are found. Five details shape how to use it.

• It goes by two names. WVDEP's Data Center page calls the database Application Enhancer (AE) in one section and Application Xtender (AX) in another, and links the same address for both.
• A login is required. WVDEP says so beside the link, and asks users to review its instructions in order to log in and query documents. The Data Center page links instructions for using the database, and the Storage Tanks page links Application Enhancer instructions of its own.
• WVDEP says "most", not all. The Tanks Unit says it is still scanning leaking underground storage tank documents into the database, so a FOIA request may be needed for those files. Do not read a missing document as a document that does not exist.
• Permits are searched in another tool. WVDEP's Electronic Submission System (ESS) has a public query. WVDEP says permits for the Division of Air Quality, the Division of Mining and Reclamation and the Division of Water and Waste Management are searchable through it, and that no account is needed.
• Maps and data sets are in a third place. WVDEP calls its Open Data Hub its public platform for exploring and downloading open data, and its Data Center page lists featured maps, among them maps of facilities with an air quality permit, landfill closure projects, mining, open dump cleanup projects and the Toxics Release Inventory.

Where to look a site up

• Application Enhancer, for documents.
• The e-Permitting Applications Search, the ESS public query, for permits and applications.
• The Open Data Hub, for data sets and maps.
• WVDEP's Data Center page, which gathers these with the oil and gas searches and the mining permit searches.

Getting the file

WVDEP says most of the records it keeps are subject to disclosure under FOIA, and that all requests to review agency files must be made in writing. Its Request Information page describes what happens next.

• Send the request. Use the electronic form on the Request Information page or email depfoia@wv.gov. WVDEP says requests may also be submitted by fax or U.S. Mail.
• Expect an acknowledgment. WVDEP's initial response gives the date the request was received, the divisions or offices that will be responding, and a fee schedule.
• Then the program office writes. Staff of the divisions or offices that have the information say whether they hold files on the request and how the requester may view or receive them.
• Large files are viewed in person. If the requested files are large, WVDEP asks the requester to come in to view them and explains how to schedule a time.

Because the acknowledgment names the offices that will respond, check it against the offices you expected. A leaking tank site that entered the UECA-LUST Program or the Voluntary Remediation Program, for example, can involve two divisions. WVDEP's Charleston headquarters is at 601 57th Street SE, Charleston, WV 25304, and 304-926-0499.

Sources

West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection pages, read October 7, 2026, no modified date shown:

• Data Center
• Request Information
• Storage Tanks