HomepageSoil contamination, remediation or survey
If you operate a business in the Netherlands and detect soil contamination or impairment at your business site or another site, you must report this to the provincial or municipal authority. You must also notify the provincial or municipal authority if you conduct activities that may contaminate or impair the soil, or instruct others to perform such activities. This includes activities that (may) lead to erosion, increased density, or salinisation of the soil.
Notification of soil remediation or reduction of soil contamination
You must notify the provincial or municipal authority of a soil remediation procedure if:
- the amount of contaminated soil exceeds 50 m³;
- the amount of contaminated ground water exceeds 1,000 m³.
If you perform activities that reduce soil contamination, or if you move seriously contaminated soil, you must report this as well. You can check on the Soil Information Desk (Bodemloket.nl) to see whether you have to notify the provincial authority or the municipal authority.
You will not have a duty to notify if:
- you can reasonably assume that the contamination is not serious;
- you move non-seriously contaminated soil only temporarily and intend to put it back.
Soil survey of business sites
If your business activities may cause soil-threatening substances to be released into the soil, you are obliged to have a soil survey carried out before you start up your business (baseline survey). This soil survey will record the soil quality at the time. Upon termination of your business activities, you must have another soil survey carried out (final survey). If the report shows that the soil was impaired or contaminated by your business activities, you will have to take remedial action.
If your business activities change, the municipal or provincial authority will decide whether a soil survey is necessary.
Combining soil surveys when buying or selling
When buying or selling a parcel of land, soil surveys can also be performed that are not legally required and serve a different purpose to those performed for activities with the potential to negatively impact soil quality. These two types of surveys can be combined under certain conditions.
