Soil monitoring on (diffuse) soil contaminationStatus of soil policy and monitoring – an overview

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© A. Pehamberger

Contents

General aspects and definitions EU soil policy Examples for EU wide soil monitoring systems Key issues for monitoring diffuse soil contamination Soil indicators for diffuse soil contamination Results and recommendations for soil monitoring Proposal for guidelines

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Soil threats

Soil erosion Decline of soil organic matter Soil contamination (diffuse and local) Soil sealing Soil compaction Decline in soil biodiversity Salinisation Floods and Landslides

Source: EC Soil Communication, 20023

Diffuse vs. local soil contamination

Diffuse soil contamination (d.s.c.) is the presence of a substance or agent in the soil as a result of human activity emitted from moving sources, from sources with a large area, or from many sources (adapted from ISO 11074).

Local soil contamination occurs where intensive industrial activities, inadequate waste disposal, mining, military activities or accidents pose a special threat to soil (EEA, 1999).

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Soil information

Soil Mapping: providing information on distribution of soil types and enabling to identify areas of land suitable for certain management purposes;

Soil Inventory: providing an assessment of soil conditions and/or properties at a point in time;

Soil Monitoring: providing a series of assessments showing how soil conditions and/or properties change over time.

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EU soil policy development

EC Communication ‘Towards a Thematic Strategy for Soil Protection’ (2002): Need to develop an EU wide monitoring system with a legislative basis

EU Thematic Strategy for Soil Protection (2006): For identifying risk areas, the Commission encourages Member States to use existing monitoring schemes

Proposal for Soil Framework Directive (2006): Preservation of soil functions,Prevention of threats to soil and mitigation of their effects, Restoration of degraded soils,No monitoring requirements 6

EU soil policy –requirements

SFD Article 9 - Prevention of soil contamination: Member States shall take measures to limit introduction of dangerous substances on or in the soil in order to avoid accumulation that would hamper soil functions or give rise to significant risks to human health or the environment.

Industrial Emissions (Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control) Directive 2010: prevention and control of emissions into soil to avoid any pollution risk, returning the site of IPPC installations to a “satisfactory state”, and periodically monitoring soil on the site (min. every 10 years)

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ICP Forest level I & BioSoil project1st survey: 1986-1996 (ICP Forest Level I)

2nd survey: 2004-2008 (Forest Focus Reg.)

16 x 16 km Grid, ~ 5.000 sites

Soil profile description

Soil sampling and analyses at fixed soil depth (e.g. Corg, bulk density, heavy metals)

Manual for harmonised monitoringhttp://www.icp-forests.org/pdf/FINAL_soil.pdf

8Source: De Vos, B. & Cools, N. (2011)

LUCAS 2009 Soil Survey

Land Use and Cover Area frame sample Survey

Project in co-operation of Eurostat, DG Env. and DG JRC

27 EU Member states1,2; ~22.000 soil samples (top soil, soil quality parameters, heavy metals)

2012: Bulgaria and Romania

2012-2013: Iceland

20xx: next3?, regular monitoring?

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Source: JRC (2012)

¹ Cyprus has joined the survey on voluntary bases, adopted the same sampling methodology , but LUCAS LC-LU data are missing. ² Malta had difficulties to adjust the sampling grid for the LUCAS standards but samples are already included in LUCAS 2009. ³Next LUCAS soil surveys will include CANDIDATE COUNTRIES.

Key issues for monitoring d.s.c.

Main diffuse sources: Atmospheric deposition Deposition of contaminants from soil erosion Direct application of substances like pesticides, sewage sludge,

fertilisers and manure.

Monitoring d.s.c. at risk areas rather than routine grid sampling (results from grid samples are useful to derive background values or reference values)

10Source: ENVASSO (Huber et al., 2009), TWG Contamination and Land management Vol. VI (Van-Camp, 2004)

Key issues for monitoring d.s.c.

Results from monitoring should enable to evaluate the impact of diffuse inputs in relation to other inputs evaluate the future state of the system

Frequency and spatial resolution average sampling intervals of 5-20 years cover repetitive areas (land use, climate, geology, soil type, soil

management systems), dependent on the scale

11Source: ENVASSO (Huber et al., 2009), TWG Contamination and Land management Vol. VI (Van-Camp, 2004)

Selected key issues and indicators

12Source: ENVASSO (Huber et al., 2009)

Data requirements

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Source: ENVASSO (Huber et al., 2009)

Critical loads exceedances

ICP Integrated MonitoringExceedances of critical loads for

acidification and eutrophication

Good relationship between critical load exceedances and empirical impact indicators at 18 ICP IM catchments

Under emission reductions envisaged for 2020 increase of level of protection is minor.

14Source: Holmberg et al. (2013) in Ecological indicators

Heavy metals in soils - Austria

Exceedances of guideline values acc. to Austrian Standard L 1075

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Soil monitoring in SEE

ESBN report (2005): Soil resources of Europe. 2nd edition

ESBN workshop (2006, Zagreb): Soil data and soil protection policies in the countries of south-eastern Europe.

Conference on Soil Protection Activities and Soil Quality Monitoring in South Eastern Europe (2009, Sarajevo).

http://eusoils.jrc.ec.europa.eu

Key issues: Many soil data are available, but often not digitised Many countries are not part of the European Union, thus

participation in project needs other funding schemes 16

Recommendations

Soil monitoring should be built on existing systems (EU, national)

Follow guidelines at EU and/or national level for setting up a soil monitoring system

System design should be implemented in a dynamic and flexible nature (action driven monitoring)

Parameter sets should address the requirements for relevant soil indicators, both short term and long term

Define and ensure responsibilities for field work, analytical measures and data base maintenance

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Proposal for guidelines

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In line with available guidelines for

Air and Water

I. General introduction

II. Guidelines for monitoring diffuse soil contamination

A. Linking d.s.c. monitoring to environmental policy development

B. Modernizing and upgrading national monitoring networks and information systems

C. Improving coordination of national monitoring programmes to d.s.c.

Contact & Information

Alexandra Freudenschuß

+43-1-31304/3691

alexandra.freudenschuss@umweltbundesamt.at

Sigbert Huber

+43-1-31304/3670

sigbert.huber@umweltbundesamt.at

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Umweltbundesamtwww.umweltbundesamt.at

13th session UNECE WGEMA Geneva ■ 1. Nov. 2012

Accumulation of heavy metals in agricultural soils Data: Baltic Soil Survey,

FOREGS Geochemical Baseline Mapping Programme, EIONET

Heavy metal accumulation index calculated. Enrichment of heavy metals in agricultural topsoils compared to subsoils in Europe

Definition of topsoils and subsoils important

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Data requirements

Site and profile descriptions

Analytical parameters Heavy metals (Cd, Cu, Pb, Zn, Hg, As, Ni, Cr) Persistent organic pollutants e.g. PAHs, dioxins, PCBs, or pesticides such

as HCH, DDT or DDE Nutrients (nitrogen, phosphor) Organic carbon, soil texture, carbonates, pH value

Biomass uptake by plants; parent material;

critical leaching; actual deposition of

nitrogen, sulphur and base cations21

Identification and Management of Contaminated sites

Source: EEA, 2007