A recent change to the AIR lease will benefit certain tenants that bring Hazardous Substances onto the Premises. Before the revision, when a lease term was expiring, a tenant was required to remove all Hazardous Substances brought onto the Premises during the lease term. Tenants frequently performed work that exceeded statutory requirements. Now, a tenant is required to remove Hazardous Substances it brought onto the Premises only “to the level specified” under applicable law.

The revision to Paragraph 7.4(c) of the AIR lease is shown here:

The new remediation standard will benefit certain tenants, including many manufacturing tenants and warehousing tenants that store Hazardous Substances. Certain tenants will pay less to remediate Hazardous Substances, and the time required to remediate may be reduced.

[A.I.R. Forms Practitioner Tip: Landlords should analyze the Hazardous Substances that prospective tenants will bring onto the Premises, and determine whether they should modify the AIR lease to restore the prior language.]

This revision was made in 2014 and applies to all AIR lease forms (including office and retail leases).