Land Reclamation and Remediation

Vanaf de Leimuiderdijk en de N207 heb je een weids uitzicht over de Wildernis en de Westeinderplas richting Aalsmeer en Kudelstaart. Het had niet veel gescheeld of we hadden tegen een ringdijk door de Wildernis aan moeten kijken, zoveel plannen zijn er geweest voor droogmaking van de Westeinderplas. Enkele daarvan maakten een redelijke kans van slagen. Uiteindelijk kon zelfs de laatste en meest doortastende projectontwikkelaar niet voldoen aan een harde eis van Rijnland. De vele plannenmakers waren onderlegd, bevlogen, visionair, integer, corrupt of hadden het beste voor met 'volk en vaderland'. Ze hadden namen die in een roman van Bordewijk niet misstaan zouden hebben: Eskes, Ebbinge Wubben, Obreen, Korthals Altes, Eijrond, Knigge en Ten Bokkel Huinink. Waar kwamen al deze mensen vandaan? Wij ontrafelen voor u de draden die hen verbonden. De opeenvolgende plannen en de voor-en nadelen van de droogmaking worden hieronder op een rijtje gezet. En natuurlijk gaan we in op de ecologische en landschappelijke ramp die Leimuiden, Aalsmeer en omgeving getroffen zou hebben als hun plannen waren doorgegaan. Maar ja, dat is met 'de kennis van nu'.

This paper examines the trends of land reclamation activities in Lagos from pre-colonial times to the present day vis-à-vis attendant socio-environmental impacts, conflicts and ramifications for a multi-ethnic society. The expansion of livable land mass in Lagos metropolis has been by reclamation and civil engineering processes.  Sand mining and extension of the city’s water frontier began quite early and has continued well into the twenty-first century. As at 2010, it was estimated that more than 40% of the Lagos land mass has been artificially formed by these processes.  However, although dredging and reclamation add such highly valued land resources for habitation, recreation, industrial and infrastructure development, official policies and regulatory measures since the new millennium seem to wrest control of the industry away from non-indigenes under the guise of environmental protection. The study relies on primary and secondary sources as well as multidisciplinary analytical tools from geography, surveying and geoinformatics (remote sensing) to assess the increase in land mass, suburbs and associated sociological issues. It finds high levels of forest depletion, increased decimation of mangrove swamps and comparatively large increases of built-up areas, coupled with heightened social tensions (such as the indigene-settler syndrome and the NIWA/LASWA dispute) and the jostle for land in evolving communities during the study period. With the growing population of Lagos as a megacity, the paper concludes by highlighting the increasing tendency for official and semi-official regulatory interventions and indigenous control of the dredging and sand-mining industries in the future as land resources become scarcer and more financially rewarding.

Nigerian indigenous shipping operators have clamoured for stronger government support to give them an edge in the competition against foreign shipping lines. The latter, mainly carriers from Europe, Asia and the Middle East, have held sway in West African maritime trade since 1849 when Woermann Linie began the first liner service to the region. Many studies in the area have shown the rise and fall of the indigenous shipping lines and the dominance by the foreign lines. Few have attempted to trace the recurrent weaknesses in the indigenous efforts. Although the government tried to encourage local shipping operators with the short-lived National Shipping Policy Decree which stipulated cargo allocation based on the UNCTAD 40-40-20 formula, many folded up due to incapacity to compete and scarcity of investment capital despite a flourishing market. The promulgation of The Coastal and Inland Shipping (Cabotage) Act in 2004 gave some hopes for resuscitating indigenous participation. Studies have shown, however, that against the backdrop of weak corporate management by the local operators and the absence of clear-cut government support for them, cabotage-implementing agencies such as Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA), Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), and the Federal Ministry of Transport are perceived to have failed by compromise for foreign carriers through abuse of the waiver clause. The paper finds that poor corporate governance, absence of requisite managerial and technical skills and political instability had constituted handicaps against local operators since the advent of the Nigerian National Shipping Line in 1959. This is the biggest issue facing indigenous sea trade in Africa's biggest economy and only a firmer enforcement of the law, as was applied against NLNG in 2013, will even the playing field and transform the capacity of local operators.

In mining operations carried out below the water table, mine area could potentially affect the surrounding. With further deepening of the mine and quarry, the drawdown can impact on water supply wells and base flow. The variation in radius of influence under confined and unconfined aquifer condition is assessed using a hypothetical case study with three operational quarry sites. Average pit-wise radius of influence (R0) for the pit mine, under unconfined and confined aquifer conditions is 963 m and 61 km, respectively, whereas effective radius (Re) for total (cumulative) excavated mine area is 1.7 and 146 km, respectively. It means that the maximum and minimum value of overall impact/influence for the unconfined aquifer lies in-between 963 m and 1.7 km. Similarly that the maximum and minimum value of overall impact/influence for the confined aquifer lies in-between 61 and 146 km. Meanwhile, Re or effective radius for total (cumulative) excavated area seems more appropriate from evaluation viewpoint due to the overlapping (superposition) concentric mining quarries. Thus, assessment of quarry-wise and total radius of influence is of importance to fulfil targeted production, economically with minimum interruptions as part of the mine planning. Moreover, it helps us to assess, monitor and regulate the impact of a mine-dewatering program in the area. Also, the pumping test is often used to estimate radius of influence; it can trigger the inflow or radius of influence. Estimate of the radius of influence using analytical equation mainly independent of discharge/abstraction from the aquifer stands as a preferred choice for the prediction of radius of influence at the quarry/mine pit. There is a strong rationale that policies should be informed by such analytical assessment because it helps us to prevent or minimize negative impacts as part of regulation and pit-mining management and are useful tools for practitioners to design economically efficient and cost-effective in situ groundwater remediation systems, to contain contaminant plumes, to evaluate the surface–subsurface water interaction and to verify numerical models.

Active chemical treatment of AMD to remove metals and acidity is often an expensive, long term liability. In recent years, a variety of passive treatment systems have been developed that do not require continuous chemical inputs and that take advantage of naturally occurring chemical and biological processes to cleanse contaminated mine waters. The primary passive technologies include constructed wetlands, anoxic limestone drains (ALD), successive alkalinity producing systems (SAPS), limestone ponds, and open limestone channels (OLC).

This chapter examines seaports in the Gulf of Guinea to understand their evolution, development, problems and major transformations during the study period. Composed of multi-ethnic nation-states carved out and colonized by different European powers during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, post-independent economic and social life in the region are conditioned by the structural colonial vestiges, with English and French as the chief official languages and a mixture of foreign and local cultures.  The study used primary and secondary sources of data to analyse change in the port industry vis-à-vis the development and modernization of infrastructure, inter-port competition amongst the countries and the reasons for predominance of some ports, the tempo of hinterland development and demographic factors affecting the port cities, the trends of containerization, terminal concessions, deep-sea and deep-water port formation and security issues such as piracy, armed robbery and kidnapping.  The study concludes by assessing the situation of the Gulf ports in the compelling dynamics of international shipping in the twenty-first century which are governed more by global benchmarking indices of commercial efficiency and compliance with extant maritime law than the demands of local politics.

Environmental geology is a relatively new discipline which has developed out of engineering geology (the geology related to civil engineering) and includes, amongst other things, aspects of the behaviour of materials and the ground, hydrology, hydrogeology, geochemistry, environmental science, the mobility and fate of contaminants in the ground.  The new environmental geologist is one of the partners in a multi-disciplinary team which is necessary for talking modern problems.

The most common way of dealing with contaminated land is through the planning system, when a site is re-developed.  There is a Government initiative to favour the re-development of brownfield sites rather than the development of greenfield ones.  Often they are derelict sites which have been abandoned by industry and still contain the legacy of their industrial past.  Typically, an organisation such as the Black Country Development Corporation or the Welsh Development Agency will rehabilitate an entire area, build new roads and provide sites to attract industry and commerce to the region.

The environmental geologist has to find out what hazards remain and how these are best dealt with in order to make the new development safe and to ensure wider environmental protection.  For example, the redevelopment of a scrap yard  will involve the cleanup of the ground which is of immediate concern to the new owner and occupiers but it may also remove accumulations of mobile contaminants that may be leaching into the rivers or groundwater, such as oil or fuel from old vehicles or more toxic chemicals such as polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) from old transformers. 

To be able to do this efficiently requires a knowledge of what went on , and where, during the history of a site – the past is the key to the present.

Now that the problems of contaminated land are being recognised more fully, the remediation of sites is not confined solely to when (and if) they are re-developed.  Abandoned metal and coal mines, where pyrite has been exposed and allowed to oxidise, pose a threat to the environment from ferruginous, acidic discharges when the mines flood.  On-going industrial concerns like oil depots are renowned for leaking pipes and underground tanks.  It is becoming more common to investigate contamination at working as well as closed sites.  This poses extra challenges for the investigating team.  Indeed, there is a new section of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 which is about to become law and requires local authorities to take action on contaminated land.

Melaleuca cajuputi has an ability to sprout easily, this is one of indicator for plants that potentially could be reproduced productively. PT Bukit Asam Ltd. has used Melaleuca cajuputi as the main of tree species for the reclamation of its post-mining land. The seedlings are produced generatively using seeds. The purpose of this research was to determine responses of IBA and Growth Media on the tip cutting of Melaleuca cajuputi The results showed that 88.9% of the cuttings, 61.2% of the rooted, and 80.9% of the shoots were viable. The used of IBA and a variety of growing media did not significantly affect to life percentage, rooted percentage, shoots percentage, fresh weight and dry weight of root, fresh weight and dry weight of shoots, numbers of primary and secondary roots, length of primary roots, and length of shoots. The result of this research can be adopted by PT Bukit Asam Ltd. to shorten production time of Melaleuca cajuputi seedlings in the future, where the availability of seeds is limited.

The highly rugged mountainous land topography of the Novorossiysk industrial agglomeration (NW Caucasus, Krasnodar Krai, Russia) and arid climate limit the restoration abilities of disturbed mine lands. Abandoned waste-rock dumps of a marl quarry occupy an area of ca. 150,000 m2 next to the cement plant, residential districts, and a commercial seaport. To assess the eco-risk, topsoil horizons of urban and mine-site Technosols and background Rendzinas were sampled and analyzed; measurements of particulate matter fractions PM1, PM2.5, PM4, and PM10 were conducted throughout the agglomeration. Fugitive dust emission from the unreclaimed marl dumps raises the PM2.5 content in the air by a factor of 2.68 on average. The high sorption capacity of the fine eluvium results in the accumulation of urban emissions by the dust and contributes to the subsequent soil pollution; the Cumulative Pollution Index of pedochemical anomalies reaches the high-risk level over the areas of up to 5 km2. Environmental threats caused by the mine dumps can be assessed more reliably by means of land zoning based on accumulated environmental damage indicators and the debris flow and waterspout risk calculation. To abate the technogenic impact caused by the mine spoils, reclamation actions must be taken including soil stabilization on sensitive sites by application of geosynthetic cover, hydroseeding of the mixture of soil improvers and seeds of herbaceous plants on the slopes, and anti-erosion plantation of cades (Juniperus oxycedrus L.) and smoke trees (Cotinus coggygria Scop.) at subhorizontal surfaces.

In the UK, the widespread presence of elemental contaminants such as arsenic and nickel in contaminated sites and more widely release of platinum group metals into the biosphere are growing concerns.
Phytoremediation has the potential to treat land contaminated with these elements at low cost. An integrated approach combining land remediation with post-process biomass to energy conversion and high value element recovery is proposed to enhance the financial viability of phytoremediation. An analytical review of plant species suitable for the phytoremediation of nickel, Arsenic and platinum group metals is reported. Additionally, a preliminary model is developed to assess the viability of the proposed approach. A feasibility appraisal using Monte Carlo simulation to analyse project risk suggests high biomass yield plant species can significantly increase the confidence of achieving financial return from the project. The order of financial return from recovering elements was found to be: Ni > Pt > As.

Land is the habitat of men. As land is having a major share on earth it should have a proper system to gather, distribute and update information of land records. Land records is the bases of all land reforms and therefore it requires regular online update. It has been seen that the village maps are not geo-referenced. The present system is not good which creates problems in our system and we suffer from great loss. This leads to demand a system which keep the proper record of lands and it is available in time. For land records GIS is a effective tool. GIS technology is having capability of capturing, storing, analyzing and displaying geographically referenced information which is needed in present scenario. The objective of using GIS for land records sytem is to provide transparent, quick and secure access to land registration and land records through internet and other devices. The workload of the land registration offices will reduce and it will decentralize the land registration process. Using GIS map of the village is mapped and attribute data is entered in data sheet which makes work easier for the citizens, various registration departments and planners. This paper brings out GIS as a tool which can be effectively used in land records. It integrates non-spatial and spatial datasets for query and better display. These maps which are geo-referenced are used in day-today life to make decisions at the base level.

This paper explores the links between remediating land for Olympic event spaces and the pursuit of legacy. In particular, it considers ways in which redevelopment of the sizeable spaces prepared for staging the event take their place in broader strategies intended to bring long-term benefits to the host city and society in order to compensate for the costs and inconvenience originally incurred in hosting the Games. There are six main sections. The first analyses the diverse nature of brownfield land and highlights salient characteristics of its remediation for use in urban regeneration. The second supplies background to Olympic legacy and indicates the importance of the changing climate of ideas in understanding the formulation of legacy over the past two decades. The third section documents the role of remediation as an option employed recently by Games' organisers when needing to find spaces of suitable size to stage the Olympics, noting how choosing remediation ab initio involves commitment to legacy. The fourth and fifth parts analyse approaches to implementing remediation, with respect to the key event spaces for two of the twenty-first century's Summer Games: Homebush Bay, which housed the Olympic Park for Sydney 2000; and the Lower Lea Valley, which served the same function for London 2012. The final section provides commentary on the wider narratives of transformation associated with deployment of remediated sites for Olympic event spaces and indicates the significance of the values that have underpinned those narratives.

This paper explores the links between remediating land for Olympic event spaces and the pursuit of legacy.  In particular, it considers ways in which redevelopment of the sizeable spaces prepared for staging the event take their place in broader strategies intended to bring long-term benefits to the host city and society in order to compensate for the costs and inconvenience originally incurred in hosting the Games.  There are six main sections.  The first analyses the diverse nature of brownfield land and highlights salient characteristics of its remediation for use in urban regeneration.  The second supplies background to Olympic legacy and indicates the importance of the changing climate of ideas in understanding the formulation of legacy over the past two decades.  The third section documents the role of remediation as an option employed recently by Games’ organisers when needing to find spaces of suitable size to stage the Olympics, noting how choosing remediation ab initio involves commitment to legacy.  The fourth and fifth parts analyse approaches to implementing remediation, with respect to the key event spaces for two of the twenty-first century’s Summer Games: Homebush Bay, which housed the Olympic Park for Sydney 2000; and the Lower Lea Valley, which served the same function for London 2012.  The final section provides commentary on the wider narratives of transformation associated with deployment of remediated sites for Olympic event spaces and indicates the significance of the values that have underpinned those narratives.

Soil water management can be defined as active involvement in controlling soil water content at an optimal state for all given purposes, including environmental needs. An optimal state is often a compromise between competing uses and needs to account for long term sustainability of the soil water system.

Electrokinetic (EK) treatment is a possible attractive way to speed up the consolidation of fine-grained dredged sediments. The effectiveness of this method depends on the complex physical–chemical interaction between soil particles, interstitial fluid and pollutants. This paper presents the experimental laboratory results obtained by inducing mechanical and EK consolidation in a fine-grained dredged material. Then, a finite-difference numerical code implemented by the authors able to solve the large and small strain consolidation equations (Lassec1), including theelectro-osmotic flow, is described along with the theoretical simplifications adopted and the calibration procedure required. The experimental results have been numerically simulated, showing the ability of Lassec1 to reproduce the coupled mechanical and electrical consolidation processes, highlighting that under very low stress levels it is necessary to take into account the highly non-linear soil behaviour, and thus the large strain theory is needed to obtain a reliable prediction of the consolidation process. With this aim, special laboratory devices are necessary for a good calibration of the permeability function and of the stress–strain relationship at very low stress levels.

Breakage of tepetates to, at least, -45 cm deep is recommended. This process was carried out with Caterpillar tractors (D7 or D8), equipped with two chisels or rippers  This work realized on substrates provides quite rough structure; hereafter a plow is required for softening the surface of the terrain. The shape and slope of the land generally determine the design of the plot for future agricultural works. The final slope of the habilitated tepetate should allow a maximum soil infiltration of the rainwater and reduce runoff in case of excess of it. It has been demonstrated that an efficient way to perform the breakage of the tepetate substrates is to make a first step with the heavy machinery in a linear direction, with spacing of 30 cm between the lines penetrated by the chisels, and then perform a second step, but this time perpendicular to the first, as if a grid were marked. Introduction of symbiotic bacteria is advisable previous to sowing leguminous species.

Abstract Multi-field/multi-season approaches used to calibrate apparent soil electrical conductivity (EC a) models for predicting soil spatial variability across large landscapes are time-consuming. In this study an alternative calibration approach was evaluated. The study was conducted on an agricultural watershed in Texas with the objectives of (i) assessing the contribution of different soil properties to EC a variability; and (ii) evaluating the feasibility of using a single calibration approach to predict soil variability across different fields. Of the ...