Cost of closing down a shooting range

[PaulB]

Does anyone have information on what the approximate cost is of closing an old gun club? We ARE NOT closing but I would like to know how one cleans up decades of rounds into multiple earthen embankments and the ground, into the woods (bullets and shotgun shot), into the trees and all the nooks and crannies on an indoor range. I did a quick "back of the envelope" calculation and figure we have 75-100 tons of lead over a area of dozens of acres. I would think the the cost of cleaning up would far exceed the value of the property if we were forced "out of business" somehow.

[sbrmike]

There are excavators out there who would do the excavating right now to reclaim the lead for small fees.

Clean the indoors yourselves with a high quality HEPA filter vacuum cleaner and remove any carpetting from the firing range part of the club. The airborne lead that is the issue is from the priming compound and it will accumulate in carpets.

Formulate a lead abatement plan. They don't have to be anything fancy. The NRA Range Developement division has lots of information.

[PaulB]

We have the plan in place to meet our legal obligation. I am just trying to find out if anyone has actually been involved in, or know of, a range that has actually been through this. We are talking about a place where the lead have been on, or in, the ground for as much as 50 years. The berms have never been mined. There are a lot of tree with bullets in them. Most of the shot from trap, skeet and 5-stand is in the woods.

I have heard that there are lead recovery firms that will pay you but I bet that is almost always in open field situations with shotgun, not difficult removals. Also, if they are removing from a range that is still in operation they don't have to get the levels down to what ever may be legally required to release the place for ordinary uses. Much more difficult!

[john bickar]

Any way you can find out what it cost the University to close the Maury Hall range? If that's offices now they had to have done lead abatement.

I seem to remember lead abatement in the OTC shooting building being in the $250K range about 10 years ago.

[jhmartin]

The 50 year old Zia Rifle & Pistol Club, south of Albuquerque has a 600 yard set of berms (100-200-300-400-600, etc), two side by side 200 yard berms, 3 action pistol berms (depth of 100yds), a 100 yd tunnel, two 50 yd plinking berms, a shotgun area, and a 50ft indoor pistol/smallbore clubhouse.
See on Google Earth, directly south of the Albuquerque Sunport.

Our land is leased from the State of NM and we are required to have a shutdown/cleanup fund set aside in case the lease is terminated. We have about $250K in the bank set aside for this purpose.

What's neat about Zia is that it is a 24/7 club (you can pull into the berms at night with your headlights) and we have about 1200 members ... they are great to the youth programs here in the ABQ area.

[chuckjordan]

Sounds like a call to the NRA might be in order. I'm sure they can guide you with their 'best practices'.

It almost sounds like you need to set funds aside.

So knowing your location (VA) and you can see mine from my profile, is it??

[Thomas Monto]

If it is the intention of the Range to close or abandon ranges any time in the future, it should consider the fact that it will be required to accomplish an environmental cleanup of the entire existing range facility. Federal regulations will require cleanup of lead upon abandonment. This matter must not be ignored. Officials may be held personally liable under the Comprehensive Environmental Response Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA). Certificate of incorporation does not protect the individual members and officers of the Range from personal civil liability. The cleanup must be accomplished in accordance with all federal, state, and local environmental regulations.

I would suggest obtaining a free copy of the USEPA publication “Best Management Practices at Outdoor Shooting Ranges”. A copy may be obtained by logging on to the USEPA web site: www.epa.gov/region2/waste/leadshot

[PaulB]

I understand that as per federal regulations the lead is considered "in use" while the range is in operation but becomes "waste" when the range closes. As waste there are particular regulations that mandate how quickly the lead must be disposed of. The NRA and EPA documents both give some information about this. I also am aware that the feds can come after club officials if there are not sufficient monies to perform the necessary clean-up. However, I am still back to my original question, does anyone know what such a clean-up might cost?

One other thing that always has amazed me about this kind of thing. I am a nuclear engineer. Commercial nuclear reactors are required to have a separate fund set aside to pay for decommissioning. University reactors are required to do this or otherwise guarantee that decommissioning funds are available. If ranges are required to do this why are they not required to assure that the monies to do it are available when needed. I think many ranges don't charge enough for use or membership because they are not considering all the present, and future, costs of operation. This is probably mostly out of ignorance, but I think there is a lot of "that's someone else's problem" or "we will never shut down" thoughts going on.

[chuckjordan]

RFI (request for information). You could put in an RFI and solicit wase management companies. Those that can't perform the work can often refer you to those that can. You will have companies providing you the information, plus documentation (returned RFI quotes) that you can take back to managment.

Again, this should be an issue the NRA has addressed and they could have a list of waste management companies qualified to perform the work. Their range managment team should be able to help. And they're due west of you by 75 miles?

BTW, some clubs fees (initial and yearly) are astronomical. raising membership dues is clearly a way to curtail early adult shooters (18-30) from joining. And many ask the question why the shooting sports are dying.

[orionshooter]

Depending on their location, many ranges are taken over by local governments exercising their power to condemn and then convert the property to another use. In those situations, the entity taking the property is required not only to compensate the range owner(s) but the taker also assumes all liability for clean up.

[smoking357]

Paul, look at Shotgun Sports magazine. There is usually a lead reclamation service advertising in there. Lead and copper are expensive. Your club should experience a profit for the metals reclamation.

Shotgun clubs do this at some frequency. You pay to put your metal on their ground, and they collect the money for picking up your metal. It's a great deal for them.

It's the easiest mining in the world, as there's an above-ground identified vein of refined metal.

[Guest]

Why clean it up at all. all the metal and lead came initially from the earth anyway and lead if undisturbed will stay inert. The environmental people are paranoid about lead but it is only dangerous to kids in older lead paint and bullet casters who do not have good ventilation.
I am nearly 80 years old and as a kid drank water that was brought to our farm by a half mile or more pure lead pipe. It bis a tempest in a teapot.

[sbrmike]

The EPA is definitely paranoid and off the mark in regards to lead, but they are the ones calling the shots.

[GCSInc]

Wolf Creek +/- 1 million dollars

MT2 does good work and trees don't stop them.

[CWN]

I personally have not done a range closure but have run many demolition projects. These projects included many different heavy metal cleanups and they are not cheap depending on the future use of the property.

There are too many different future uses with associated clean up requirements to go through here in this post. I have seen costs for such clean up projects in the range of $0 to $ 3 to $5 million. It all depends on the intended FUTURE use and EPA requirements at the state and federal level.

With regard to the comments that the club can make money from the lead, in the 20 + years I have been involved demolition and recovery work I have seen only one project be cash positive. There are to many unknowns in a project of this type because you don't always know what is on or under the surface. Even if it has been a range for 100 years someone in the past may have dumped or buried something that may require additional clean up.

I am sorry to sound so negative but you need to do a lot of research and there is information on the web about similar cleanups at other ranges that will give you some ideas of what to look for.