Paul Bardos

r3 environmental technology ltd

The stinging nettle Urtica dioica L. is a perennial crop with low fertilizer and pesticide requirements, well adapted to a wide range of environmental conditions. It has been successfully grown in most European climatic zones while also promoting local flora and fauna diversity. The cultivation of nettle could help meet the strong increase in deman...

The remediation of contaminated land using plants, bacteria and fungi has been widely examined, especially in laboratory or greenhouse systems where conditions are precisely controlled. However, in real systems at the field scale conditions are much more variable and often produce different outcomes, which must be fully examined if ‘gentle remediat...

Government contaminated site regulators, as policy executors and makers, have a profound impact on the development of green and sustainable remediation (GSR), but their cognitive level of GSR has not been well-studied. China has some experience in the management of contaminated sites and has the foundation to promote GSR. This study was conducted i...

Historic land contamination in England is managed primarily via a specific regulatory regime called “Part 2A” and via the planning system which governs land use across the country. The contaminated sites regime in England is mature stretching back to before the 1990s. The primary modus operandi is risk management to assess and determine appropriate...

Hydrogen is becoming important clean energy while zerovalent iron (ZVI) and ferroferric oxide are of great interest to many applications including environmental remediation and chemical catalysis. Here, we report production of hydrogen, zerovalent iron and ferroferric oxide octahedron by etching Al–Fe alloys using NaOH solutions. The rate of hydrog...

The scale of land-contamination problems, and of the responses to them, makes achieving sustainability in contaminated land remediation an important objective. The Sustainable Remediation Forum in the UK (SuRF-UK) was established in 2007 to support more sustainable remediation practices in the UK. The prevailing international consensus is that risk...

The application of a large-scale (ca. 59,000 m²) integrated phytomanagement system at a carbon tetrachloride (CCl4)-impacted site at Murdock, Nebraska, USA, was assessed in terms of its effectiveness in mitigating site risk, and realizing wider social and environmental benefits. Volatile Organic Compound (VOCs) concentrations (including CCl4) measu...

The sustainable management of post-industrial coasts is a major emerging issue globally. Along such coasts, there may be a significant legacy of both contaminated land (including historic landfills and non-managed waste disposal) and contaminated sediments in and around urban and industrial areas, which require new strategies for cost-effective and...

Recent devastating hurricanes demonstrated that extreme weather and climate change can jeopardize contaminated land remediation and harm public health and the environment. Since early 2016, the Sustainable Remediation Forum (SURF) has led research and organized knowledge exchanges to examine (1) the impacts of climate change and extreme weather eve...

Brownfield regeneration to soft reuse such as recreation and amenity has become increasingly common due to the demand for the potential environmental, social and economic benefits that it can deliver. This has led in turn to an increased demand for improved tools to support decision-making for this style of regeneration: tools which are simple to u...

NanoRem (Taking Nanotechnological Remediation Processes from Lab Scale to End User Applications for the Restoration of a Clean Environment) was a research project, funded through the European Commission's Seventh Framework Programme, which focuses on facilitating practical, safe, economic, and exploitable nanotechnology for in situ remediation of p...

Sustainability considerations have become widely recognised in contaminated land management and are now accepted as an important component of remediation planning and implementation around the world. The Sustainable Remediation Forum for the UK (SuRF-UK) published guidance on sustainability criteria for consideration in drawing up (or framing) asse...

• We analyse the market potential of nanoparticle technologies for remediation. • We link anthroposphere (market, policy, society) & lithosphere (soil, groundwater). • We apply an explorative, deliberative, expert based scenario development approach. • We find that several factors drive market evolution and conclude on interventions. • Dialogue of...

Sustainable remediation is the elimination and/or control of unacceptable risks in a safe and timely manner while optimizing the environmental, social, and economic value of the work. Forthcoming International Organization for Standardization (ISO) Standard on Sustainable remediation will allow countries without the capacity to develop their own gu...

Environmental contaminants can have negative effects on human health and land, air and water resources. Consequently, there have been significant advances in regulation for protecting the environment in developed countries including the development of remediation frameworks and guidelines. On the other hand, fewer studies have been reported on the...

In line with Minamata Convention (http://www.mercuryconvention.org) the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Building and Nuclear Safety in Germany (BMUB )has supported the collation of a significant amount of EU funded R&D outcomes related to mercury contamination of land held by EUGRIS (www.eugris.info). The updated informat...

The UK Prosperity Fund project in Colombia on Strategies for rehabilitating mercury-contaminated mining lands for renewable energy and other self-sustaining re-use strategies ran from mid-2016 until early 2017. It intended to deliver change by providing a range of science based strategies to rehabilitate mining sites affected by soil mercury pollut...

Recently completed reports highlight options for the cost effective remediation of former gold mining sites for mercury and other metals for the sustainable reuse of the sites, including for renewable energy generation. This work was sponsored by the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office in partnership with the Ministries of Environment and Mining in...

The aim of this study has been to assess the overall sustainability gain (economic, environmental and social benefits) of transforming a former landfill site in the Wirral to a riverside park, the Port Sunlight River Park (PSRP). The Land Trust are particularly interested to have a financial evaluation of these sustainability benefits to help demon...

This article provides an overview of the developments concerning sustainable remediation (SR) from the authors’ perspective. A short history of policy development is outlined, in which the focus mainly lies on the Netherlands since this is the homeland of the majority of the authors. The Netherlands is a densely populated country with high pressure...

Widespread international consensus exists on the hazardous exposure values (and appropriate safe levels) for mercury and other metals in soils and other media.  Low cost, plant-based agronomic techniques already used in many other countries can be adapted to reduce risks from mercury and other metal contaminated sites in Colombia  Gentle Remediat...

The aim of this short briefing is to explain how low input (" gentle ") remediation combined with soft (non-built) re-use of land can provide a sustainable and cost-effective means of restoring land for longer term economic and community benefit, for example on mercury impacted sites resulting from artisanal gold mining. Colombia has an enormous op...

This short guidance document provides an overview of the information needed to: (1) assess opportunities for the joint deployment of gentler remediation and renewables production on sites in Colombia, (2) understand the technical parameters of the approaches available, and (3) perform assessments of overall sustainability and link this to cost bene...

NanoRem (Taking Nanotechnological Remediation Processes from Lab Scale to End User Applications for the Restoration of a Clean Environment) is a research project, funded through the European Commission’s Seventh Framework Programme. NanoRem focuses on facilitating practical, safe, economic and exploitable nanotechnology for in situ remediation of p...

Stakeholder engagement is an important part of the governance of the emerging technologies. It can help to inform decision-making and collect perceptions, opinions, and attitudes towards a certain technology. Nanotechnology, including nanoremediation, has received much attention in recent years. The use of nano particles in remediation offers poten...

Since mid-to-late 2000s growing interest for sustainable remediation has emerged in initiatives from several international and national organisations as well as other initiatives from networks and forums. This reflects a realisation that risk-management activities can about bring environmental, social, and economic impacts (positive or negative) in...

There are a number of specific opportunities for UK and China to work together on contaminated land management issues as China lacks comprehensive and systematic planning for sustainable risk based land management, encompassing both contaminated soil and groundwater and recycling and reuse of soil. It also lacks comprehensive risk assessment system...

Gentle remediation options (GROs) are risk management strategies or technologies involving plant (phyto-), fungi (myco-), and/or bacteria-based methods that result in a net gain (or at least no gross reduction) in soil function as well as effective risk management. GRO strategies can be customised along contaminant linkages, and can generate a rang...

This paper presents a holistic approach to sustainable urban brownfield redevelopment where specific focus is put on the integration of a multitude of subsurface qualities in the early phases of the urban redevelopment process, i.e. in the initiative and plan phases. Achieving sustainability in brownfield redevelopment projects may be constrained b...

Contamination of soil with trace elements, such as Cu, is an important risk management issue. A pot experiment was conducted to determine the effects of three biochars and compost on plant growth and the immobilisation of Cu in a contaminated soil from a site formerly used for wood preservation. To assess Cu mobility, amended soils were analysed us...

Supplementary Information to DOI 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2015.12.001

The scale of land-contamination problems, and of the responses to them, makes achieving sustainability in contaminated land remediation an important objective. The Sustainable Remediation Forum in the UK (SuRF-UK) was established in 2007 to support more sustainable remediation practice in the UK. The current international interest in ‘sustainable r...

Sustainable remediation guidance, frameworks, and case studies have been published at an international level illustrating established sustainability assessment methodologies and successful implementation. Though the terminology and indicators evaluated may differ, one common theme among international organizations and regulatory bodies is more comp...

Soft re-use of brownfields describes intended temporary or final re-uses of brownfield sites which are not based on built constructions or infrastructure ('hard' re-use). Examples of soft re-uses include the creation of public green space. These are essentially uses where the soil is not sealed. Often the case for soft re-use of brownfields has not...

So what overall points are we raising in this article? Well there seems to be a problem with defining limits for PTEs in digestates because of the liquid state of many digestate products. In order for digestates to retain EoW status within the PAS110 specification, quite lenient PTE criteria have been devised, which could lead to significant qualit...

A Special Session on “Nanoremediation - your future business opportunities” was co-organized as part of the AquaConSoil Conference 2015 by Paul Bardos (r3 environmental technology ltd, GB), Stephan Bartke (Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research - UFZ, DE), Nicola Harries (CL:AIRE, GB) and Hans-Peter Koschitzky (University of Stuttgart, DE). T...

This is the first of two free sessions intended to provide delegates with sufficient information to decide if nanoremediation and new techniques in nanoremediation is a viable activity for their organisation. It is particularly targeted at practitioners such as site owners/managers, service providers (consultants contractors), and regulators. Nano...

Gentle remediation options (GRO) are risk management strategies/technologies that result in a net gain (or at least no gross reduction) in soil function as well as risk management. They encompass a number of technologies, including the use of plant (phyto-), fungi (myco-), and/or bacteria-based methods, with or without chemical soil additives or am...

This report outlines work undertaken by NanoRem which had the aim of developing an understanding of the “value proposition” (i.e. the overall promise of value to be delivered) for iron nanoparticles/nanoscale zero valent iron (nZVI) use in remediation. In the report, a risk-benefit appraisal has been used to give the current state of knowledge for...

This document has two broad purposes: to provide a background and NanoRem context for sustainable remediation and to provide a procedure to carry out a qualitative sustainability assessment of the nanoremediation technologies to be used at the pilot sites. Each nanoremediation will be benchmarked against at least one possible alternative remediatio...

Nanoscale zero-valent iron (nZVI) is the most commonly used nanoremediation material. While there has been a reasonable level of application of nZVI technologies for in situ remediation in the United States, its utilization across Europe has been much more limited. There has been significant uncertainty about the balance between deployment risks an...

This report seeks to develop an understanding of the “value proposition” for iron nanoparticles/ nanoscale zero valent iron (nZVI) in remediation in terms of a risk benefit appraisal of its use given the current state of knowledge. Scenario analysis is used to explore likely market potential and the factors affecting this over the short, medium and...

This is the first of two free sessions intended to provide delegates with sufficient information to decide if nanoremediation and new techniques in nanoremediation is a viable activity for their organisation. It is particularly targeted at practitioners such as site owners/managers, service providers (consultants contractors), and regulators. Nano...

Marginal, often contaminated, sites exist in large areas across the world as a result of historic activities such as industry, transportation and mineral extraction. Remediation, or other improvements, of these sites is typically only considered for sites with high exploitation pressure and those posing the highest risks to human health or the envi...

In the past decade or so, management of historically contaminated land has largely been based on prevention of unacceptable risks to human health and the environment, to ensure a site is “fit for use” (i.e., achieves suitability for beneficial uses). More recently, interest has been shown in including sustainability as a decision-making criterion....

This report brings together activities of case studies to show where and how HOMBRE project tools and principles were tested. Subsequent chapters provide an overview of each case study and describe which tools were applied and how successful those tools were found to be along with the lessons learned and thoughts future directions.

Note this review is best viewed on line at http://www.compostinfo.info/ where updates and additional resources are available. The aim of this review is to collate the large body of existing, and apparently forgotten, information about composting mechanically separated fractions of municipal solid waste (MSW) including sampling and sample preparati...

This report is the presentation and explanation on how to use this design aid to better assess and design soft reuse interventions and services within brownfield regeneration processes. We explain and show how we connect services with interventions and the other way around. How to implement this in the regeneration process in order to increase the...

The HOMBRE (Holistic Management of Brownfield Regeneration) project seeks to aid both the prevention of sites from becoming brownfields (BFs) and the regeneration of existing BFs into usable sites. Work Package 5 of the HOMBRE project aims to improve solutions for long term land use of current and potential future BFs. To achieve this, WP5 looks to...

The Roadmap to a Resource Efficient Europe suggests that by 2050 there should be no net land take sealed by built development. This will only be possible with effective “recycling” of formerly used land for buildings and infrastructure (“hard development”) and unsealed uses (“soft development”). Of course across Europe a large amount of land recycl...

NanoRem (Taking Nanotechnological Remediation Processes from Lab Scale to End User Applications for the Restoration of a Clean Environment) is a research project, funded through the European Commission’s Framework 7 research programme. NanoRem focuses on facilitating practical, safe, economic and exploitable nanotechnology for in situ remediation....

Nano-scale zero-valent iron (nZVI) is the most commonly used nanoremediation material. While there has been a reasonable level of application of nZVI technologies for in situ remediation in the USA, its utilisation across Europe has been much more limited. There has been significant uncertainty about the balance between deployment risks and benefit...

In the past decade or so management of historically contaminated land has largely been based on prevention of unacceptable risks to human health and the environment, to ensure a site is 'fit for use', i.e. achieves suitability for beneficial uses. More recently, interest has been shown in including sustainability as a decision-making criterion. Sus...

Abstract This paper explores adaptation of basic contaminated land risk management methodologies to sustainable regeneration and remediation: • For a sustainability effect to be manifest there needs to be a “pressure” of some kind, a “receptor” that can be affected by that pressure; and, crucially, a mechanism through which the pressure influences...

This paper explores adaptation of basic contaminated land risk management methodologies to sustainable regeneration and remediation: For a sustainability effect to be manifest there needs to be a "pressure" of some kind, a "receptor" that can be affected by that pressure; and, crucially, a mechanism through which the pressure influences the recepto...

A number of networks worldwide are debating how to achieve sustainable development when remediating or regenerating damaged sites or land area. These include established national initiatives such as SURF in the USA, SuRF-UK, SuRF-NL, SuRF-ANZ and SURF-Canada as well as newer initiatives in other countries, e.g. Italy, Brazil and China. The two majo...

All over the world Sustainable Remediation Forums are paving the road for sustainable development of contaminated land. In a combined session these forums would like to demonstrate and discuss their approach through short presentations of case studies and discussion.

The HOMBRE project’s overarching aim is to develop new approaches to improve Brownfield (BF) regeneration in terms of performance and sustainability in a holistic way and show new opportunities to generate greater value for private and public investors. At the core of HOMBRE’s approach is the use of integrated processes (treatment trains) to delive...

Sustainable remediation has come to exist as a popular term used to describe contaminated site management that is demonstrably sustainable, i.e. where some form of sustainability appraisal has been used in decision making to identify the “most sustainable” approach for any particular management intervention required. The “most sustainable” approach...

This short document summarises the SuRF-UK indicator categories following their further development and refinement in worked case studies and discussion groups. A description of 15 categories of indicators spread over environmental, social and economic factors that can be used for sustainability assessment in support of remediation decision-making...