Oil Tank Removal Delaware

Oil heat was popular before natural gas was broadly available after the deregulation of natural gas in the 1970's.    What this means is that homes built prior to the 1970s' had oil heat as that was the only available option for heat.

The chart below is from the US Census and shows the history of oil heat in Delaware.

Oil was king until the 1990's, hence why so many oil tanks are in Delaware.

Unsure if a property has an oil tank, visit our oil tank sweep page.

Oil Tank Sweeps

Eventually oil heaters needed replacement and natural gas was available and could be run to the house to not only supply heat but also for hot water, dryer and stove.  Making gas a much more versatile fuel.

Gas made tanks an Easter egg of sorts.  Without regulations requiring the oil tanks be addressed, tanks were left in the ground.  To be fair converting to gas costs money for new equipment so the expense of removing an oil tank was not always in the budget.

Today people selling homes are hopeful or forgetful that the buried oil tank is a concern.  The rub is tanks rust, oil can leak and the owner of the property is responsible for cleanup.  Small cleanups can approach the $10,000.00 mark.

Bottom line purchasers of homes don't want the expense of dealing with not only an oil tank removal but also a possible remediation.

The typical course of action for removing and testing an Underground Storage Tank (UST) is detailed in the following DNREC flow chart.

DNREC has a Tier O sampling protocol of testing soil after the tank is removed for DRO (diesel range organics).  Permissible action levels are 1000 ppm or lower.  Higher levels can dictate soil remediation.

Ultimately a property owner can receive an NFA (No Further Action) letter, basically saying that DNREC (*Delaware's environmental agency) agrees that appropriate regulations have been followed and no further action is required.

Smart Oil Tank Facts

1. If you are buying a home with an oil tank, you want a DNREC NFA or a report from the certified tank removal contractor stating levels are below tier 0.   

2. Sellers should know that although they bought a house with a tank, new buyers don't want to buy a problem.  

   
   
   
   

3. Sellers need to address oil tanks before listing the property for sale, you can't hope the buyer doesn't have internet access or a knowledge relator or attorney that isn't going to flag the tank as an issue.

4. If you have a house from 1950's in say Wilmington and Newark Delaware and you want to test the oil tank, forget about it.  The tank is beyond a reasonable life expectancy and needs to be removed and replaced.  It is simple too old.

Curren has over 25 years experience, we are licensed in Delaware, Pennsylvania and New Jersey for tank removal. 

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