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Organisation

Mission, tasks, organisation and international projects

"Soil+" was established in 2005. In terms of position, it falls between the Ministry of Infrastructure and the Environment and the local authorities such as municipalities, provinces and district water boards. Its budget is provided by the Ministry. The clients of Soil+ comprise the different authorities involved with land and groundwater management.

Mission
The mission of Soil+ is as follows:
"Putting policies and legislation into practice and vice versa."

Tasks
Soil+ performs a wide range of tasks. Approximately 25% of these activities are directly derived from current legislation. Examples include:

Assessing site remediation programmes and soil treatability.
Updating the contaminated sites inventory and mapping the environmental quality of the Dutch soil.
Prioritising public funding for site remediation based on risk assessment and the urgency of remediation.

About 50% of the tasks are related to consultancy, for example:

Providing strategic and hands-on advice to local authorities in all matters involved with soil, groundwater and sediment issues (such as remediation, reuse, landfilling and treatment).
Offering input, which is based on thorough knowledge of current practices, for new policy development, to ensure feasibility in practice.

The other tasks concern the following:

Developing and transferring knowledge in the areas of site investigation and soil sampling procedures, soil quality standards and risk assessment models, in-situ site remediation and ex-situ soil treatment technologies.
Co-developing regional soil and groundwater management plans.
Exploring options for underground heat storage.

Organisation
A broad skill-based organisation – around 40 staff members strong – covers the full spectrum of activities in the soil sector. Quality assurance and transparency form the basis of the activities of Soil+. Our intention is to enhance society’s confidence in the organisation, and ultimately in the soil sector itself.

International projects
Soil+ actively promotes knowledge sharing in policy development, legislation, science and technology on soil and groundwater issues with other governments and foreign companies. In this process, we work closely together with the Ministry of Housing, Spatial Planning and the Environment [www.vrom.nl], the Netherlands Soil Partnership [www.nsp-soil.nl], the National Institute of Public Health and the Environment [www.rivm.nl], the Rijnmond Environmental Protection Agency [www.dcmr.nl], our sister task groups at SenterNovem "Waste Management" [www.uitvoeringafvalbeheer.nl] and "Infomil" [www.infomil.nl], scientific institutes, consultants and contractors. In this process, we perform government-to-government projects primarily in Romania and, to a lesser extent, in Turkey, China and Canada.