Joint SoBRA / RSC Winter Conference 2024
Current Issues in Contaminated Land Risk Assessment

Date: Tuesday 10th December 2024
Venue: The Royal Society of Chemistry, The Library, Burlington House, Piccadilly, London, W1J 0BA
Hybrid In-person and Virtual Conference.

For all tickets, SoBRA members need to register as a Non-RSC member, then enter the discount code provided in the recent email to SoBRA members when prompted. Bookings close at 5pm on Monday 2nd December 2024.

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In-person – RSC/SoBRA members £110 / non-members £150 / Students 50% discount / 20 x 50% places* for not-for-profit and regulators £75
Online – RSC/SoBRA members £50 / non-members £75 / Students 50% discount / unlimited x 50% places* for not-for-profit and regulators £37.50

*Discounted Tickets for Regulators and Not-for-Profit Employees. A limited number of 50% discounted tickets for regulators/non-for-profit employees are available for in-person attendance on a first-come first-served basis (50% discounted online tickets are unlimited). Please email [email protected] to request your discount code, stating whether you wish to attend in-person or online. The discount code can then be entered at the checkout under ‘Enter promotional code’.

Early Careers Poster Competition 2024

Are you an early career professional (less than seven years’ experience in the field of risk assessment) and would like to showcase your work in advancing UK (or international) risk assessment best practice? If so, then the early careers poster competition is for you!

First Prize: £200
In addition, the first five submissions will be granted free conference registration for the SoBRA / RSC Winter Conference (Tuesday 10th December at The Royal Society of Chemistry, Burlington House, Piccadilly, London).

Details:
• Posters can be on any topic relating to UK (or international) brownfield risk assessment, or a case study for an unusual / non-standard project with a risk assessment basis;
• Posters should be prepared in A1 portrait format, and submitted in advance (in pdf format) to [email protected] by Friday 15th November 2024 for judging;
• It is expected that all competition entrants will either provide a printed A1 copy of their poster for display at the conference, or will attend in-person with an A1 printed copy of their poster for display on the day of the conference;
• Posters will be judged by members of the SoBRA Executive Committee, taking into account aspects such as novelty, benefit to risk assessment, clarity and visual impact.

Upcoming Early Careers Webinars 2024/2025

The SoBRA early careers group is pleased to announce that another series of free lunch-time webinars will be run during 2024 and into 2025. Each webinar is geared towards early career professionals and will provide guidance and top tips on topics. Webinars run for an hour, including a Q&A session, and will all be hosted on GoToWebinar – we thank RSK for allowing us to host these events on their account.
All webinars are free to attend, but all attendees are required to register in advance.

CURRENT PROGRAMME:

The Importance of the Ground Model
(Chris Everitt 24/10/24 at 1pm)

A discussion on why the ground model is so important to building a robust conceptual model and how this can lead to successful remediation. Illustrated by case studies of chlorinated solvent contamination in groundwater from a site on granular alluvium in the East Midlands and a site on a chalk Principal Aquifer in the east of England.

Registration link: https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/6496998157678955351

Newcastle Allotments Lead Biomonitoring Study:
Assessing Gardeners’ Lead Exposure in Urban Agriculture Sites to Improve the Derivation of Soil Assessment Criteria
(Lindsay Bramwell, 14/11/24 at 1pm)

In the UK, the current soil screening level for a ‘low level toxicological concern’ for lead in allotments is 80 mg/kg (DEFRA, 2014). This soil screening level is 10 times lower than that observed on many allotments across Newcastle upon Tyne, a city in NE England, with a long industrial heritage. Detailed quantitative risk assessments have been previously carried out on Newcastle’s allotment gardens and Newcastle City Council concluded that, on balance, gardening activities and consumption of vegetables from these sites is a greater benefit than risk to health, however, there is considerable uncertainty in the exposure modelling, with the association between concentrations of lead in soil and blood remaining uncharacterised. The aim of this study was to determine the relationship between concentrations of lead in garden soils and the blood lead concentration of gardeners to give confidence to regulators who must decide the suitability of a site. Participants provided blood and saliva samples and helped the team collect soil, vegetable and fruit samples from their plots. To account for confounders, participants provided tap water samples, home dust samples, atmospheric deposition samples and completed a questionnaire on potential exposure factors.

Registration link: https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/2905411539711493726

Part 2A Investigation of Vapour Intrusion from Chlorinated Solvents
(Simon Burr, Campbell Reith, 3/12/24 at 1pm)

Presentation of a case study which covers a Part 2A investigation into contamination of the soils and groundwater at a former dry-cleaners in Ross-on-Wye. The predominant pollutant pathway was associated with vapours from the chlorinated solvent plume which had migrated off site beneath existing residential buildings. The investigation comprised multi-level boreholes, vapour wells, and in-house vapour sampling, both in-house and sub slab. The investigation needed to account for fractured bedrock, potential vapour flow through the unsaturated zone, topographic falls across the wider area, consideration of preferential pathways (sewers) and background solvent concentrations. It also included a detailed communication strategy with emphasis on the off-site residents to enable entry to their properties.

Registration link: https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/8842506048864761178

Recordings of previous webinars are available on the Early Careers Webinar page.