Greener Cleanups

Improving Environmental Outcomes

Greener cleanups conserve natural and material resources, reduce waste and minimize air emissions while bringing sites back into productive use.

A greener cleanup is a more sustainable approach to cleaning up contaminated sites. EPA's “Principles for Greener Cleanups” provide a foundation for planning and implementing cleanups that protect human health and the environment while minimizing the environmental footprint of cleanup activities.

Objectives

Image showing natural plants on a remediated site

Implementation

Tools

Cropped image of truck and solar panels at waste site

Greener Cleanup Consensus Standard

Standards

A photograph of a drainage pond surrounded by grasses. Next to the pond is a gravel road leading to a building.

ASTM Standard Guide for Greener Cleanups

Featured News

Executive Order 14008 on Tackling the Climate Crisis at Home and Abroad. Greener cleanup strategies help meet the E.O. goals by integrating renewable energy, deploying clean fuel and emission technologies, protecting water, sequestering carbon, conserving land, protecting critical ecosystems and biodiversity, and using nature-based solutions.

Executive Order 14057 on Catalyzing Clean Energy Industries and Jobs Through Federal Sustainability. The E.O. sets policy to build a sustainable infrastructure and achieve a carbon pollution-free electricity sector by 2035 and net-zero economy-wide by 2050.