Transcript
Speaker: Hello and welcome to this new episode in French of Pardon My Planet. in which we will explore soil health in Europe. Je suis un noir. And today we are going to and often invisible for our soils, the different forms of pollution.
Speaker: Soil pollution affects vast areas in Europe the old industrial sites and mining areas on agricultural lands exposed to pesticides and heavy metals, It threatens biodiversity, water quality, food security and human health.
Speaker: And yet, it remains one of our time.
Speaker: So I have the Derrick, who is a the Michel Chalot.
Speaker: who is a professor at the Marie and Louis Pasteur University. who specializes in the development of solutions based on by using plants and microbes to remedy soil pollution. and who today represents the Edafos project as a coordinator.
Speaker: the foundations. Et pour ce faire, de quoi on parle exactement lorsqu 'on dit soil polluted and why especially why it is a challenge in Europe and why the subject is sometimes difficult to apprehend for the general public.
Speaker: It's true that it's a been discussed for a very long time and that... In
Speaker: in any case follows these principles, both methodological and regulatory. um au delà de ça c 'est vrai que c 'est un sujet which concerns, of course, all of Europe, with, as you said, past...
Speaker: that we continue to different methodologies to or etc.
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Speaker: to buy a land, he will be able to go to GeoRisk see if... His field is concerned by, perhaps... to a former service activity or which has potentially polluted in this area. Was there an action of pollution? So that too is something that... on which we will communicate in France.
Speaker: Same thing with an action of... because we And we will also have a whole framework.
Speaker: France we... We have the chance to benefit devices such as the information sectors soils. That is to say that from moment when state knows... of conaissance june pollution in these soils.
Speaker: create what we call this famous information sector on the soils, that is to say that we are going to frame the changes. We call it change of use, but in the I So that's it. And we will also have other devices that will allow us to take this pollution into account. So we are still...
Speaker: In France, specifically, we seem to have good framework and regulations that
Speaker: or at least to be uniform, I have the when we talk about polluted soil, without taking into account the
Speaker: I would say that the difficulty... it has always been at the European level. to find a kind of harmonization. in both site management tools, tools...
Speaker: of detection of pollution, etc. Eh? We finally got there, but very recently. It's the famous... Sol monitoring law, la loi sur le... the monitoring of soils.
Speaker: And so... And so why did we take so long? to agree at the European level law, and again, it is not complete, it is not perfect, because... It's called Sol Monitoring. It means that we haven't gone deep into things, but it's a first step.
Speaker: Well, simply because We have levels of pollution that are very different from one country to another. the origins of pollution that are also very different from one country to the other.
Speaker: Um, Objectives Also, maybe. Yes, objectives. What do do with these polluted soils? And so all that. And so... This European law is a first step towards...
Speaker: the recognition of, finally,
Speaker: uh as a heritage that is common to all Europeans. But there is still work to be done because we need to... in context of this law. to demonstrate that indeed...
Speaker: to highlight where polluted soils are located in Europe, because... There are 2 .5 million sites polluted in Europe. We don't have a very precise map yet. We have one in France, but on a European scale, it's less obvious.
Speaker: Um, So just the fact... to harmonize measurement and detection tools of soil. This is already a big step forward. Um... So the of pollution is advance in the to...
Speaker: from now until 2050. to harmonize the monitoring of polluted soils in Europe. So that's a first step. But it's true that it took time. It took time because there countries that were a bit... we will say not necessarily inclined to...
Speaker: about it, etc. We have to align with the public policies of each country, of course. their strategy, is really want to prioritize or not? I imagine that in France it was taken to heart quite quickly.
Speaker: which is not the case in all the countries in Europe. In France, all the management of polluting systems is based on... on a document which is the methodology of polluted citizens, the PHM. Um,
Speaker: which the BRGM has strongly contribute. Um, It's a document that comes from the Ministry of... of the environment at the time. a first version, you stop me if I'm wrong Virginie, the first version dates from 2007 and then a new version that appeared in 2017.
Speaker: It is an extremely valuable tool for the of polluted sites. This is where, indeed, indicate the and to implement.
Speaker: to better manage and restore these polluted sites, with an important focus in the new directive from 2017 on, finally, casconfeso seat luage frequent recets at themos get primordial basset luelra was it well learned What
Speaker: Um... Today, are we going to... proceed to an analysis. Is this analysis going to give us pollutants, or at least types of pollutants that are in these soils, at what level?
Speaker: Did we set up a European scale. if it exists or on a scale in France.
Speaker: And how do these pollutants affect raviju soli from foxho ma gijereiolui el ah fala a fooculle fra sadutti dannuti ah conapel lab e the the to of research on...
Speaker: What is an activity? to link the polluting to activity. Um... the methodology, any case in France, makes rest...
Speaker: by the activities, will make a famous polluting activity matrix. and then they will do their analysis program.
Speaker: certain we have stopped on the quality of the interior air. Are they the same everywhere in Europe? These thresholds to respect?
Speaker: And so, quality thresholds will be French. me on no like a little laricterior on the rob but We're already facing a first obstacle.
Speaker: do ah do la directive neppa la directive sir la dunc roin kijanet abdute found milvanzak ah nepa sure de So directive directive So
Speaker: the databases that we already have in France, in particular on the ICPE regulation, all the activity and the substances that are associated with each activity. And then we also have a map of the old industrial sites. activities of service,
Speaker: Then, in prioritiation the
Speaker: um And in Islender, it was done by aggregating a whole... All the
Speaker: that can be generated from the
Speaker: and which are quite new, so we may not be used to meeting them. And it's a bit seen as a checklist, so not at the site level, it's not going to be at the site level, but at the national level to see, well, we still have this knowledge and these components are worrying. Do we need to regulate them? Do we need devices? of support in the management of polluted soil sites and of these substances. So it's a bit like a checklist to see if this substance is well managed in France. And then this prioritization tool also gives information on a list of emerging substances that we do not have sufficient knowledge of to say if there is a risk for the environment and for humans. And so it's a bit of a researcher checklist. Look, there we have a hole in the racket. We cannot know if these substances are worrying or not.
Speaker: So that's what was developed in the Icelander project. And it's true that the prioritization in terms of polluted soil cities is...
Speaker: the volume of polluted cities and soils. potentially polluted already, just potentially.
Speaker: And so, this prioritization step will be reinforced with directive that really emphasizes the need for prioritization. Michel? What do you what is polluting, they affect the life of the soil, they are perhaps functioning on the biological aspect.
Speaker: Uh... Indeed, there was. beaucoup d 'études qui ont porté sur, finalement... What is the impact of these pollutants? on... life on the ground, simply. So the ground is perfect. A polluted soil is not just a soil... in quotation marks, dirty, it's a soil that is...
Speaker: which is transformed, which is mostly degraded, I would say. So it's true that... Um... there is a affected. So it could be just the PH, for example. besh but largely affected by the presence of pollution, it can be the structure of the soil itself, which will be modified.
Speaker: It's life, obviously, on the ground. For example... the microorganisms whose certain categories will disappear in favor of others are not necessarily... les plus souhaités dans la vie. in microbial communities.
Speaker: for toangier but promoier the living. look get answer Polluted soil is often soil... in which fertility decreases, basically.
Speaker: So finally... less biodiversity. knowing that biodiversity, especially microbial biodiversity, is an essential parameter in the soil, since is what makes plants healthy, among other things.
Speaker: So the microorganisms that disappear, earthworms too, we see earthworms a lot as soil indicators, they are really... Among the best soil indicators, when they completely disappear from the soil, you really have to worry about it.
Speaker: So... the pollutants affect. the structure of the ground. biodiversity of soils and so has consequences in cascade finally because where we feed ourselves with foods that are...
Speaker: that we have pushed on the ground. So as soon as the ground is disturbed, we will produce less and potentially of less good quality. and potentially We will also find contaminants. We hear a lot cadmium at the moment, cadmium that we find... in the cereals that we find in the chocolate, it's typically...
Speaker: of political problems. due to the pollution of the soil by the cadmium that is in the phosphate fertilizers. And then there is not only that, there are also pollutants that go...
Speaker: potentially migrate towards the phreatic maps. Don't worry. It's a whole that makes, indeed... Um... the soil pollution affects the... food security somewhere and therefore human health.
Speaker: Michel, you mentioned cadmium which is a...
Speaker: extremely important for us. It's true that communication on polluted land sites is an exercise that is not simple. All soil pollution experts know that. That is to say that the risk perception will be... the most often very underrated, that is to say that perhaps lack of knowledge on the way in which pollutants evolve.
Speaker: in the middle.
Speaker: the And that's where all the communication... ah
Speaker: a transmetre settan for matro de fasonla per sample pragmatic puip de ah cascoce in pollution ah pescuek only meaire collective contonalgian pouchon wants to the and the a
Speaker: Dans la vie... every day on whether I have a risk or not. Il y a on that contact with these pollutions.
Speaker: whether by direct soil ingestion for the smallest who bring Tanté plus de etc. We're going to... look very specifically at the way in which humans are...
Speaker: um And... is in on the other hand, an improvement route, so there is always room for advanced for for for the general population. However...
Speaker: The risk assessment for the issues... environmental issues or issues that we could qualify as ecological. For the moment, we don't have the tools. And this is the object of many studies and work by R &D to integrate precisely an evaluation of the risk that we could qualify as proportionate.
Speaker: And I would add that the difficulty is that... Finally, soil pollution is something invisible. And so, we don't see it, we feel it. It's going to act.
Speaker: in the long term. Contrary to... The example you were taking is the Black Sea. We can see right away. or a peak of air pollution, for example, where we immediately see the effects. There, soil pollution is something that is going to...
Speaker: which will spread over the long term. And so, in the end, citizens don't necessarily make the link between... the ground and their food. their health.
Speaker: they don't say well say se coplica on moon when saturday ver i'm paedrick poer da force mo no doli cole And We try to explain to sixth graders, for example,
Speaker: We have a unpolluted soil. We have a cup with pieces of plastic, pieces of canettes, etc. to say, there is visible pollution. And then we have a vocal with... invisible pollution.
Speaker: Good night. that we figured out in the form of a coloring. And so... To see it, the kid has to put water in and then he recovers the water and he sees that the water is colored. And that's how we try to...
Speaker: to transmit this... This idea that finally... L 'essentiel de la pollution est invisible, mais il faut la considérer. And that's the whole point of the... de la loi sur la...
Speaker: European soil monitoring. To diagnose characterize soils is the public. What do we communicate? Why?
Speaker: Voilà, comprendre... What is the acceptable risk? It's not always... It's not always easy, I would say, because the... The crucial step in all this is to make a diagnosis.
Speaker: Thank you. You have to identify the site. And for that, you have to have the skills. So we call on the study offices, we call on the institutes. like the BRGM, Lineris, which are...
Speaker: effectim on app preanttoota no de purion so so answer they don't o see the of on So these are things that are important to check.
Speaker: There are also very persistent contaminants, some of which will disappear relatively quickly. because they will be degraded by microorganisms. but in the soil for several decades. pesticides, among others. I work on a site in Paris.
Speaker: where we have a site polluted by tracine. Tracine has not been used for 30 years on this site, but it is still present.
Speaker: who are present. And precisely after having... to this characterization of often make the
Speaker: Or not necessarily? Or is it just an idea that we make ourselves like that? It's true that necessarily, if there was a can expect to find... of the associated pollutants.
Speaker: Surtout que... It's the
Speaker: Combien de temps et à quel moment? I often remember this example of... It was at a conference where the diagnosis had shown...
Speaker: So it was for chlorinated solvents which, at a certain time, did not have a supply chain.
Speaker: Les déchets ne... were poured onto the the the to du but timo no say
Speaker: which have a impact on to to say, they can be, as here, it was a very strong impact because there was important quantity of products.
Speaker: api pre soon la fason on poo am mean all of the ownmo he said they show me aka mi po don van to but aul kero the treish ah a foco cc And on
Speaker: a abarnapeo like kaliti deu su terrena kiiaulul de dan namon vernaval come um yeah clamon dis unpack this activity and the pollution
Speaker: les sols de surface, mais aussi les sols en profondeur. Il y a toute... Sur le principe, les sites de sol pollué, c 'est très simple. On étudie la source, les transferts et les cibles. Et après, c 'est quand on étudie dans
Speaker: For some pollutants, in fact... they complex dynamics. And maybe it's also... the difficulty of understanding that.
Speaker: which means that it's not always easy to And but help?
Speaker: a resttoria aristore and sour soto ael mamo on they seed the savoian vi she is ze who tells to
Speaker: It's really an important question because... Indeed, there are solutions. Well, yeah. conventional. which are still used and important and necessary.
Speaker: le cavaionmocini e staacid the These are solutions that are still being used. misanthrope aujourd 'hui quand on a des relatively restricted areas, in particular, a service station, for example, that we would like to deploy, well, it's a few tens, hundreds of square meters.
Speaker: After, when it comes to de -polluting several tens of hectares, it becomes complicated to implement these technologies. So sometimes we have no choice but to use solutions.
Speaker: So that's what we call it, that's the term that corresponds to what we do. and in particular through the use of plants and microorganisms. We address different types of pollution depending on the type of pollution.
Speaker: We work more with microorganisms that have the so we are more interested in organic pollutants. The best examples are hydrocarbons. We know for a long time that hydrocarbons...
Speaker: They learned it during evolution because they know how to degrade the original molecule. the molecule that constitutes wood, so all the mushrooms that degrade wood. are also able to degrade hydrocarbons. So it's not very complicated and there are many applications.
Speaker: I was... which are proposed by study offices in this area. Then there are new ones. contaminants. which are a little more exotic.
Speaker: because they are molecules that do not exist in nature. We talked about epiphases earlier. Epiphases are typically unknown molecules. uh, For the... for the living.
Speaker: And so these molecules are a little more complicated. uh, There are research projects that
Speaker: Science is moving forward, but there is still work to be done. As far as metal pollution is concerned, um
Speaker: And so for that, we can call on to poplars, etc., which tend to accumulate them.
Speaker: And so in the long term,
Speaker: as we observe them in the agricultural fields. for example, we can consider solutions based on use of plants.
Speaker: And we can also combine the two, that is... to have consortiums of plants, of microorganisms, namely...
Speaker: is that we have multi -contamination. That's a big problem. in the management of We often find next to the concrete, we will find PCBs, we will find hydrocarbures.
Speaker: I think that if we looked, we would also find pythons everywhere now, microplastics. So... The is to find the... good assembly of living organisms. to manage this multi -contamination.
Speaker: So it's on aspects that we work, especially in the EDAFOS project. But it's not easy because, indeed, It takes several... We have to optimize the of remediation.
Speaker: And when we then know that each site and its own characteristics. in terms of soil structure, in terms of... of temperature, etc., of pH. there it complicates things again and we have hard time to develop generic We have developed a lot of generic solutions in past.
Speaker: There, we really come back to case by case, that is, we try to... to find solutions that are suitable for everyone. at each site and at each polluted area. That's where the difficulty lies.
Speaker: Obviously, when it's generic, it's much easier. When it's specific, it's a little more complicated to
Speaker: rather than generic, and by the the
Speaker: Un peu Yaka Faucon. Allons -y, lançons les travaux. Et quand on on Ah
Speaker: techniques like venting, which consists of aerating. So, Does the develop also techniques of depollution more adapted to site. so the
Speaker: it is to make an extraction of this soil of some ... Maybe a small amount. There are many possible tests that can consolidate the work of depollution. will depend on the technique considered.
Speaker: yeah a le And the Bioindicators are living organisms.
Speaker: animals, plants, plankton, bacteria. that react to the
Speaker: to find out about the health status of the soils. And so... When we implement remediation solutions, We made a preliminary diagnosis. We said to there are so many earthworms per square meter.
Speaker: and we see if finally
Speaker: Thanks to the in the case of the Etafos project or in other projects. European. That means that... Verifying the impact of tomppe con pan ferco planted the
Speaker: these solutions have a positive impact soil health. that we worked on a valla du proge on to France, but also with the directive, we will manage the risk.
Speaker: according to the use that is envisaged. In France, often when we have... For example, a classification for the environment makes... which closes its activity, which is in cessation of activity. um the level of risk
Speaker: in relation to use. C 'est ce qui va être un petit peu le... Not the driver, roman call objective but objective. Voilà. L 'objectif de dépollution, c 'est quel objectif on a pour...
Speaker: Qu 'est -ce qu 'on
Speaker: um you don't push islander on i'm mont rico city yeah vre And the a
Speaker: What state is this site in order to integrate... this information in the choice of depollution techniques, without putting it in a postcard or... umqu fa
Speaker: Without saying, on as ecological issues in proximity, etc. Well, there, I may have to implement...
Speaker: in
Speaker: I don't want this pollution to be there, whether it's chlorine solvent or hydrocarbons. um and what technique I'm going to put in front of it, and with this objective of the functioning of a soil. So process, which we qualify as pedological, but in fact which is in their functioning,
Speaker: will have a certain number of, will infiltrate the water, will allow a cycle of carbon, will constitute a habitat for the living, etc. So what do we want from this soil? And to put things together a little bit, in a way, on, yes, I want to depollute, but what do I expect from others?
Speaker: de mon sol. And nationale...
Speaker: have only this vision. Polluant. and still not at all this health vision, in fact, health of the soil. And before maybe concluding, in relation to that, we have mentioned the different regulatory frameworks that exist.
Speaker: in France and in Europe. And today... When we talk about... of funding Where are we in the management of polluted sites and soils? I would say it depends on the context.
Speaker: On a toujours le fameux principe de pollueur payeur. Ça, ça s 'applique. According to the impact, according to the type of pollutant, according to the geology, it can cost... très, très important.
Speaker: it course cost a lot. um If we are in an ICPE in general, we apply... the responsibility pollution. from historic So here, when we come across historical pollution, or what we call defective responsible sites...
Speaker: C 'est -à -dire que le on is doing in France. And there we have, that is to say that we put in security.
Speaker: the site so that pollution does not come out of the site and a security. To add, finally, because it's a bit... the nerve of war also on the funding of research, finally.
Speaker: um in France of programs. the the pro and of restoration of polluted soil.
Speaker: Um... through funding tests, for example. There is also the ANR, the National Research Agency, which finances many projects. related to pollution in polluted urban areas. And then in Europe, we have the Horizon program in particular.
Speaker: and in particular the which regularly finance research programs. The management of sites is polluted. soil pollution in Europe and soils more generally in Europe.
Speaker: Thank you. an important and essential component because it is part of the eight missions. that europe for which Europe has finally given the means.
Speaker: the to develop research programs. So the So that means that, indeed, at the European level... We care a lot about art.
Speaker: to the de la bonne santé des sols. There is a regulatory system that has been put in
Speaker: of de -pollution, because often what happens, what still happens, is that we de -pollute at the end of an industrial activity. and just trila Uh, so that there is another industry that can... But if afterwards I have an administrator who wants to come
Speaker: And there, to facilitate processes of change of activity, what we qualify as change of use, so industry... um And then, for example, all the houses behind. um see uh Finally, the developer can resume...
Speaker: la responsibility that havewood de poion e connao entoy make kun sufa the deolion duu andduri directtomo ah ver lu e fin ski perme ah but bincurro as so po responsibility the Michel, thank you conversation.
Speaker: I think we will conclude. You gave us a complex. but we have an idea of the extent of the challenge.
Speaker: and the of which you work through the soil .earth .com.
Speaker: And until the next episode, I wish you... une agréable journée. Merci beaucoup Virginie et Michel, et à bientôt.
