SUITMA 2 - Nancy, France

The second conference, chaired by J.L. Morel, was organized from July 7th to 11th, 2003, in Nancy, Lorraine, France. It was organized by the GISFI (Groupement d’Intérêt Scientifique sur les Friches Industrielles - Scientific Consortium for Research on Brownfields - http://www.gisfi.fr) under the umbrella of IUSS, AFES and DBG. This conference put a special emphasis on industrial sites. Indeed, as in many areas where heavy industry had been predominant during the 20th century, the Lorraine Region faced a dramatic depression of its industrial activity from the 80’s of 20th Century. As a result, large brownfields appeared, which were characterized by deeply disturbed soils that presented high levels of pollution (e.g. PAHs, metals).

The conference was organized in six sessions, including:

– methods for the study of urban soils and classification;

– biological properties of urban soils;

– pollution dynamics and transfer risks;

– physical and chemical properties of urban soils;

– remediation of degraded or polluted soils;

– historical , health and legal aspects.

Conference was attended by 130 participants from 20 countries.

Four one–day tours were organized (C. Schwartz, L. Florentin):

– Industrial soils from mining residues, dumps and coal mining areas;

– Soils with modified physical properties due to mining and military activities in the Red Zone of Verdun;

– Industrial soils from an iron-steel industry area

- ‘Urban soils’.

Two main decisions were made during the closing session:

i) addition of “Military” areas to take into account soils deeply transformed by wars and military activities, and cover the total spectrum of SUITMAs,

ii) to settle the Working Group SUITMA under the roof of Division III “Soil Use and Management” which was chaired from 2002 to 2010 by Wolfgang Burghardt in the new structure of IUSS.

excursion Volklinger Hutte, Saarbrucken, Germany (Fot. W. Burghardt)

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Detailed description of the event by W. Burghardt was presented in:

Burghardt, W. (2003): Second conference of the IUSS working group SUITMA -Soils of Urban, Industrial, Traffic and Mining Areas, Nancy, France. In St. Nortcliff, A.E. Hartemink (Editors): IUSS Bulletin 104, 2003/2: 27-29. ISSN: 0374-0447. http://iuss.boku.ac.at/files/iuss_bulletin_104.pdf

excursion Franzosicher Park Saarbrucken, Germany (Fot. W. Burghardt)