North Lanarkshire has an industrialised past, including a significant coal mining legacy. Created by BGS alongside WSP UK and North Lanarkshire Council (NLC), the new coal mine gas risk decision-support tool helps to provide a preliminary risk assessment of coal mine gas emissions in North Lanarkshire. The tool utilises publicly available data and information from BGS and the Mining Remediation Authority on the subsurface to inform an instant risk zone rating for any 50 m × 50 m grid cell within the North Lanarkshire area.

The tool is now live and being used by NLC to identify areas at potential risk of coal mine gas emissions and communicate them to relevant planning applications for new building or housing developments, helping to manage the risk.

The presentation “Application of Statistics in a Part 2A Determination” outlines the use of site zoning and statistical assessment to assist the Council in the detailed assessment and determination under Part2A of the Environmental Protection Act at the former Crigglestone Colliery & Coking Works site in Wakefield. The site had a long historical use as a coke production plant with an integrated tar distillation and by-products works. Following closure in the 1960s, the site was redeveloped for a mix of residential, commercial, and open space park uses. The Council had specific concerns that the residential area had been developed at the location of the former tar processing plant. Statistical assessment was used in a multiple lines of evidence approach which led to the determination and remediation of 44 residential properties.

Following on from the Part 2A investigation presentation at the 2024 SoBRA winter conference, the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea (RBKC) has worked together with AECOM and Peak Environmental Services to generate normal urban background concentrations and RBKC Category 4 type criteria (with AECOM) and Category 3 type criteria and a bespoke DQRA modelling tool (with Peak Environmental Services) for lead in the borough.

Normal background statistics have been generated for lead in RBKC using the British Geological Survey’s ‘London Earth’ dataset for Kensington and Chelsea and presented alongside other national and local datasets. To generate Category 4 and Category 3 type criteria, detailed modelling has been undertaken using local data, for example using the results of extensive plant uptake studies and exposure frequencies to better reflect the use that is likely to be made of gardens by the borough’s residents.

The existing Category 4 Screening Levels provided for lead are widely considered conservative and so generating local criteria is potentially of great benefit for the assessment of lead during developments and for initial decision making under Part 2A. It is hoped that, by providing more reasonable criteria, more proportionate and sustainable borough based decisions will be able to be made and soils will be conserved.

The legal landscape surrounding per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) cases is evolving as scientific understanding, regulations, public awareness and media attention increase.  This presentation will consider the main challenges related to definitions, exposure and toxicology.  It will include a focus on the key issues of foreseeability and causation.  Establishing specific causation is critical in personal injury cases, but no single disease is definitively linked to PFAS exposure.  Proving a direct link between PFAS exposure and an individual’s specific health condition is complex due to long latency periods and multiple exposure sources.  Multidisciplinary expert teams are required to address these issues.

The United States remains the focus for the largest international class actions, including the recent multidistrict litigation (MDL) involving thousands of cases.  In 2023, 3M reached a $10.3 billion settlement to address claims related to contamination of public water supplies.  PFAS litigation still has the potential to become one of the most significant issues in UK environmental law in the future.  Differences in regulatory frameworks, litigation culture and legal mechanisms shape how each country addresses the risks posed by PFAS. 

This presentation summarizes a comprehensive study of groundwater contamination in the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, based on 35 years of radiological monitoring. The research highlights the role of natural attenuation processes—such as sorption, radioactive decay, and dispersion—in controlling the migration of radionuclides. Data from long-term field observations and hydrogeological modeling demonstrate that contamination levels have significantly decreased over time, with limited off-site migration. These findings provide critical insights into the long-term environmental behavior of radionuclides. They support the effectiveness of natural attenuation as a sustainable strategy for managing contaminated groundwater in post-nuclear accident zones.

Element laboratories have seen a significant increase in the number of samples requested for lithium analysis – no longer an emerging contaminant, as insurance companies consider lithium to be a recognised risk. Lithium is highly reactive and flammable, and is stored under inert oil. It is the lightest metal existing as a solid, with a density of 0.534 g/cc and floats on water. It does not occur in the free metallic state, but is present in granitic minerals such as feldspar and quartz, or extracted electrolytically from sea water. It has a high charge and power to weight ratio. The mining waste is toxic to wildlife and lithium itself can be corrosive on skin contact, plus the dust can cause respiratory problems. Lithium has a wide variety of uses in the medical, weapons, industrial and commercial sectors, however, Lithium battery fires are increasing, with a number of causes and devastating outcomes.

A case study will be presented for the assessment of a former oil field site in the Middle East, which was in the process of being handed back to the state for future pasture use. The site, in operation since the 1970s, has soils impacted by petroleum hydrocarbons due to its historical activities. To support decision-making and facilitate discussions with the state, Arcadis conducted a bespoke assessment to further characterise potential risks to human health.

Critical receptors identified during the development of the conceptual site model included nomadic populations and subsistence farmers, with a key exposure pathway associated with the consumption of animal products (e.g., camels and horses). This case study will delve into the challenges of characterising exposure pathways for atypical scenarios, the limitations posed by in-country analytical testing techniques for petroleum hydrocarbons, and the complexities of selecting appropriate toxicological data for the exposure modelling conducted. The outcomes of the assessment, including the implications for risk management and future land use, will be explored, providing valuable insights for similar assessments and unique exposure scenarios

In 2022 SoBRA awarded a research grant to the University of Greenwich to systematically assess dissolved hydrocarbon concentrations as a function of hydrogeological and well construction parameters. The work was carried out at the University of Greenwich aimed to provide robust scientific evidence to validate the use of ‘rules of thumb’ in contaminated land site investigation and risk assessment for the presence of non-aqueous phase liquids (NAPL). The project is linked to the work being undertaken by our NAPL sub-group and aimed to investigate the so-called “1% rule”. In this presentation the findings of the study will be presented.