Soil Protection
The principles of soil protection, which must be followed in the use and maintenance of soil in gardens, agriculture and also in construction, are briefly summarised below:
- Intact soil should be preserved as a valuable resource and conserved as far as possible.
- If soils have been contaminated by influences in the past, this must first be investigated in order to assess the consequences. If pollutant levels are so high that there is a risk to users, measures must be taken (e.g. restriction of use, remediation) - a case that fortunately rarely occurs in our country.
- Where possible, excavated soil should be reused. However, pollutants should not be spread further in the process (no contaminated excavated material on clean soil).
The services we provide for landowners, builders and planners include pollutant investigations, soil protection concepts and, for example, accompanying of soil movements during construction (private control).
Soil protection and remediation within the framework of the Dunkelhölzli garden project
As part of the project Gartenareal Dunkelhölzli, around 3.8 ha of new garden areas will be created on the outskirts of Zurich, embedded in a spacious, publicly accessible local recreation area with a stream redesign. Already in a very early planning phase Simultec AG has carried out a comprehensive soil investigation on the area on behalf of the city. Since on certain partial areas too high pollutant loads had been determined (exceeding the test value of the VBBo), a remediation project had to be worked out afterwards. Our soil and contaminated site experts are also members of the planning consortium and are responsible for the soil project during the building application and for the specialised site management during detailed planning, submission and execution.
Client: City of Zurich's administration
Period: 2010 to date