DELIVERABLES SOILval

SOILval Summary reports and synthetisis

• Presentation Kick off meeting SOILval
• SOILval end of project – summary report (EN)
• Synthetisis – SOILval project results, (EN)
• Synthèse – Résultats du projet SOILval (FR)
• SOILval Final meeting SOILveR Pilot Call (presentation EN)
• SOILval short video presentation (EN)

SOILval Work Package reports

• Work Package 2 Report – Etat de l’art juridique et technique
• Work Package 3 Report – Consultations avec les parties prenantes
• Work Package 3 Report – Annexes
• Work Package 4 Report – Analyses et recommendations

SOILval Policy brief and R&D Note

• Note R&D Besoins en recherche et développement pour une meilleure intégration de la qualité des sols dans la planification et l’aménagement du territoire, 18 pages.
• Policy Brief Wallonie – L’intégration des qualités du sol dans le droit de l’aménagement du territoire, 6 pages.
• Policy Brief France – Etat des lieux et perspectives d’évolution de la qualité des sols en droit français dans un contexte d’aménagement, 6 pages.

SOILval Technical Fact Sheets in FRENCH

• Face aux défis de lutte contre l’artificialisation et étalement urbain en France et en Wallonie : 7 fiches pour vous accompagner à considérer les fonctions écologiques des sols en planification et aménagement du territoire.
• SOL et sol… un accord parfait?
• Le SDC et le SCoT… au service de la qualité écologique du sol.
• L’évaluation environnementale… ou comment améliorer la qualité écologique des sols.
• La désimperméabilisation des sols, pour un retour de la nature en milieu urbain.
• Le génie pédologique pour recréer des sols fertiles…
• Connaitre la qualité des sols en France et en Wallonie et les outils d’aide à la décision en appui à la refonctionnalisation des sols.

SUMMARY

Recognising SOil values in land use planning systems (SOILval)

The overall aim of the SOILval project was to assess whether and how soil biodiversity, functions and related Ecosystem Services (ES) (‘soil values’) are or could be better recognised in land use planning systems in France and Wallonia in the perspective of ‘no net land take’ objective by 2050.

Far from being only a simple physical substrate for urban development, agriculture and infrastructures, soils and their biodiversity, functions and associated ecosystem services (here after ‘soil values’) provide for multiple key benefits to society, from carbon storage, timber and crops production and water purification to recreational activities. Soil values are currently hardly taken into account in land use planning law and practices. However, the recent ‘No Net Land Take by 2050’ objective set up by the EU Commission and by an increasing number of Member States may encourage the development of integrated land and soil protection and sustainable management solutions in land use planning policies, such as integrated green infrastructure planning, protected areas, nature-based solutions, compensatory mitigation hierarchy, de-sealing and brownfield regeneration and ES assessments.

In this context, the SOILval project aimed specifically at:

• Improving knowledge of technical solutions and land management tools integrating soil values in land use planning in France and Wallonia;
• Assessing the degree and legal challenges of integration of soil values into land use planning instruments and decision-making processes in in domestic law;
• Improving knowledge of the stakeholders’ perception of their needs, difficulties, feedback regarding the feasibility of soil refunctionalisation solutions, decision support tools, databases on soil quality data and legal instruments studied in 1) and 2);
• Drawing recommendations from steps 1) to 3) to enhance integration of soil values into land use planning systems in France and Wallonia in the context of “No net land take by 2050”.

SOILval project team carried out an in-depth technical literature review and legal analysis to draw the current state of the art on soil refunctionalisation solutions, decision support tools, databases on soil quality data and instruments in land use planning and their level of operability/ legal feasibility (see deliverable D2.1). Based on their strong network of land management actors, project partners gathered relevant stakeholders to undertake targeted consultations via a web survey and a web café (see deliverable D3.1). Recommendations were drawn to promote the consideration of ecological soil functions in particular in land planning and management in France and Wallonia( see deliverable D4.1).

The SOILval deliverables were transformed in easy reading format for better dissemination to the of French and Walloon public and private stakeholders involved in land use decision-making processes .

Two policy brief were written with recommendations on how to better integrate soil quality in land planning and development (one for France and one for Wallonia)

The SOILval project also proposes a note on “R&D needs” for better integration soil quality. And the results from the technical review art were summarised in a series of fact sheets to help local authorities ( and other stakeholders) towards a better integration of ecological soil functions in land planning and development tools, in implementing soil refunctionalisation solutions in redevelopment projects, in decision supporting tools for refunctionalisation projects, and in the organisation of soil quality knowledge across France and Wallonia.

The project team gathered French and Walloon legal and scientific soil experts. BRGM (coordinator) brought expertise in soil refunctionalisation solutions , knowledge of quality data organization and science-stakeholder interface (Elsa Limasset, Corinne Merly, Pauline Bâlon), Maylis Desrousseaux (CNAM) is an associate professor in environmental law, interested in soil quality. Dr. Florence Baptist, brought her expertise in ecological functionality assessment and ES evaluation. UCLOUVAIN brought expertise in Walloon spatial planning and territorial development strategies, (Pr. Yves Hanin, Fiorella Quadu, CREAT-UCL), and experience in legal analysis of interactions between urban planning and biodiversity (Pr. Ch-H Born, Dr. Aurélien Hucq) SERES-UCL). SOILval expertise was complementary, providing multi-disciplinary skills.

Partners
BRGM (France)
UCLOUVAIN (Belgium- Wallonia)
CNAM (France)
BIOTOPE (France)

Deliverables

• Presentation Kick off meeting MISSOURI
• Mid-Term Rapport
• English brochure Missouri
• French brochure Missouri
• Dutch brochure Missouri
• ILS report
• Final report
• Video Pitch Final meeting Missouri
• MISSOURI Presentation Final meeting SOILveR pilot call 8th March 2022

SUMMARY

MISSOURI focuses on microplastics (MP) in soil and groundwater and aims at conducting a state-of-the-art review along a “sources-transfer-exposure” continuum and organizing a European-scale interlaboratory study in order to provide recommendations on separation and analytical methods in an idea of harmonization.

Scope
Microplastics in marine and surface waters have been studied for many years whereas soil and groundwater are emerging environmental compartments for undergoing studies. The MISSOURI project has two major goals:

• to conduct a state-of-the-art review on microplastics in soil and groundwater and other relevant terrestrial connected media (e.g. plants);
• to organize an European-scale interlaboratory study (ILS) on the determination of microplastics in soil (separation and analytical methods).

This work aims at proposing a harmonized definition for microplastics, a set of laboratory methods for the separation and analysis of microplastics in soils and at identifying priorities for future projects. It also aims at giving first recommendations for decision-making and management of soil quality regarding the potential risks associated with microplastics in soil and groundwater.

The strength of the MISSOURI project lies on a survey (fall 2020) that involves experts, stakeholders and end-users in order to collect on one hand their current difficulties and concerns encountered with MP management and treatment, and the other hand their expectations on data collection and future studies.

State-of-the-art review

It will address the following topics for microplastics:

• emission sources specific to soil and groundwater;
• polymer types and their toxicity;
• existing methods for sampling and characterizing soil and groundwater samples;
• interactions of plastics with the terrestrial biota;
• main entry routes into environmental compartments (soil, groundwater and terrestrial food chain) and potential exposure pathways for humans;
• transport mechanisms and their scales;
• observed/expected impacts on terrestrial ecosystems and Human health.

European-scale interlaboratory study

The consortium will participate to an interlaboratory study (ILS) on the Analysis of Microplastics in Environmental Matrices organized by WEPAL/QUASIMEME. This study will focus on the characterization of microplastics in environmental matrices including soils. There is little to no standardization work taking place and existing methods have not been compared so far. The comparison of existing methods on “reference soil samples” prepared on purpose for this project at a European scale is therefore an innovation. It will help to understand and quantify the differences among existing methods and propose reference protocols applicable to plastic fractions. The ILS will be based on one synthetic soil sample (silica sand) and one real soil sample (sandy soil) spiked with microplastics. This will ensure both comparability of methods in well-controlled situations and applicability to real samples.

The MISSOURI project is led by Ineris (France) in charge of overall coordination and state-of-the-art review in partnership with the Stichting Vrije Universiteit of Amsterdam (VU; Netherlands) in charge of the ILS coordination and ISSeP (Wallonia) in charge of soil spiking. This partnership builds upon the capacity of each partner to collect, understand, analyze, criticize, propose and disseminate knowledge on microplastics in soil and groundwater.

Partners
VU, the Netherlands
ISSeP, Belgium- W

DELIVERABLES

• Presentation PREMISS Kick-off meeting 17th November 2020
• Midterm report June 2021 
• Final report December 2021
• Presentation PREMISS final meeting SOILveR Pilot Call 8th March 2022
• PREMISS Executive summary
• Annex L
• Video pitch PREMISS February 2022

SUMMARY

PREMISS project deals with Contaminants of Emerging Concern (CECs) focussing on soils and sub-surface media. The aim of PREMISS is to build a robust and flexible prioritization prototype, enabling update and improvement such as substance and data addition.

To offset the current lack of data, PREMISS team aims to develop a modular prototype prioritisation tool for CECs allowing the estimation of CECs occurrence and their associated risks in the soil and the sub-soil for various levels of data availability (including missing or partial information).

For that, several complementary tasks are planned:

• Compilation of existing occurrence data of CECs in soils and the sub-soil
• Review of existing data on sources and emissions on CECs
• Calculation of CECs expected soil occurrence from sources and emissions data through compound-specific fate, transport and physico-chemical properties for model substances.
• Assessment of risks from CECs present in soils and the sub-soil to human health and to the environment
• Stakeholders’ involvement to define prioritisation needs and expectations and draw recommandations

Anthropogenic activities (agricultural, industrial and households) release thousands of synthetic chemicals in the air, soil, and water [1] environmental compartment. These substances, which fall under the REACH regulation are potential candidates as Contaminants of Emerging Concern (CECs) regard to environmental quality. Despite the fact that CECs have risen increasing attention and work over the past recent years for the water compartment (surface water mainly), there has been hardly no attention to soil as a receptor of CECs. PREMISS project proposes to develop a prioritisation approach 1) to assess which CECs is likely be present in soils and subsoils, 2) to evaluate which of these CECs may pose human health and/or environmental risks and 3) to select which CECs require most attention and additional understanding, from management, policy and R&D perspectives.

One of the major challenges of the project is to develop a robust methodology. The challenge lies in the very large number of chemical substances to consider and the lack of existing data. The lack of existing data results in uncertainties associated to the assessment of substances fate and transport and their potential toxicity. Based on methodologies and tools already tested for the water media (surface and groundwater), the PREMISS team proposes to develop a rational strategy for CECs prioritisation applicable to soil and sub-surface. The PREMISS prioritisation approach will be driven by three principles: a) using the Source-Pathway-Receptor conceptual scheme for risk assessment; b) combining existing field data and calculated data; c) involving stakeholders to define their needs and draft recommendations.

The prioritisation approach will have the following specific objectives:

• Develop a modular prototype prioritisation tool for CECs enabling the estimation of their occurrence and the associated risks in the soil and the sub-soil for various levels of data availability (including missing or partial information), based on:
• Test the robustness of this prioritisation tool for a selection of CECs and make recommendations for future development
• Based on the prioritisation approach and its results, propose opportunities for CECs management and policies (if possible) and recommendations for future R&D work.

The consortium is constituted by research‘s teams from the 3 countries involved in the SOILVER call: RIVM and Deltares for the Netherlands, ISSEP, Arcadis and Witteveen & Bos for Belgium (Wallonia and Flanders) and BRGM for France (project coordinator). This will enable the collection of national data and wider European feedback and experience from their on-going work and current participation in European networks (NORMAN, NICOLE, EmConsoil, CIS Working Group Groundwater, etc.).

Partners
DELTARES, The Netherlands
RIVM, The Netherlands
ISSEP, Belgium- W
ARCADIS, Belgium – Fl
Witteveen+Bos, Belgium – Fl