Federal Department of the Environment,Transport, Energy and Communications DETEC

Federal Office for the Environment FOEN

News from Switzerlandon Soil Monitoring & Data Management

Fabio Wegmann September 18, 2007

Soil Section

2 Soil News from Switzerland | EEA workshop on Soil, 18:09:2007Fabio Wegmann, Swiss Federal Office for the Environment

Agenda

• Brief introduction of myself• National Soil Observation Network (NABO)• National Soil Pollutants Database (NABODAT)

3 Soil News from Switzerland | EEA workshop on Soil, 18:09:2007Fabio Wegmann, Swiss Federal Office for the Environment

Short Introduction of myself

• Ph.D. in chemistry from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich• On modeling of transport, behaviour and fate of

Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs)• I joined the soil section at the Federal Office for the

Environment at the end of 2006• Main topics

• NABODAT• EEA activities• Chemical aspects of soil protection

• My coworkers send greetings!

4 Soil News from Switzerland | EEA workshop on Soil, 18:09:2007Fabio Wegmann, Swiss Federal Office for the Environment

National Soil Observation (NABO)

• In operation since 1984• 105 locations, different land usage• Monitoring of:

• Nutrients: N, P, ... (soil fertility)• Soil parameters: pH, OC, physical & biological parameters• Pollutants: Pb, Cd, Cu, Ni, Cr, Co, F, Hg, Zn, PAH, PCB, ...

• Some sites are sampled each year, but most are every 5th year• 4th complete sampling and analysis campaign completed soon • 48 locations with additional mass flux monitoring• Quality management: i.e. with round robin tests, systematic

error analysis

Not included here: cantonal soil observation

5 Soil News from Switzerland | EEA workshop on Soil, 18:09:2007Fabio Wegmann, Swiss Federal Office for the Environment

Swiss Soil Monitoring Network

chemical change: 8 heavy metals and Fchemical status: PAH, PCB, Dioxinebiological and physical properties: field experiments to evaluate methods

status soil properties: depth profile, pH, CEC, ...

6 Soil News from Switzerland | EEA workshop on Soil, 18:09:2007Fabio Wegmann, Swiss Federal Office for the Environment

56 Trueb (Kt. Bern)arable mixed dairy farm

since 1996: cattle-manure, poultry and pig manure

7 Soil News from Switzerland | EEA workshop on Soil, 18:09:2007Fabio Wegmann, Swiss Federal Office for the Environment

64 Duggingenorchads (cherry)mixed dairy / arable farm

since 1996: cattle and pig manure, pesticides, gras cutting,

8 Soil News from Switzerland | EEA workshop on Soil, 18:09:2007Fabio Wegmann, Swiss Federal Office for the Environment

51 Wartauspecial crops:vegetables

Sampling design

soil depth: 0-20 cm

9 Soil News from Switzerland | EEA workshop on Soil, 18:09:2007Fabio Wegmann, Swiss Federal Office for the Environment

More Information & Contact

• Homepage• http://www.nabo.admin.ch

10 Soil News from Switzerland | EEA workshop on Soil, 18:09:2007Fabio Wegmann, Swiss Federal Office for the Environment

NABODAT: Goals

• To harmonize soil pollutant data storage in Switzerland

• To consolidate all soil pollutant information sources in Switzerland

• To serve as a tool to analyse and assess spatial and temporal trends on different levels

• To facilitate overall soil status reports (i.e. to EEA)

• To be the soil element of the Swiss Environmental Data Centre

Parcel

Canton / Region

‚Catchment‘

Municipal Comm.

National

11 Soil News from Switzerland | EEA workshop on Soil, 18:09:2007Fabio Wegmann, Swiss Federal Office for the Environment

NABODAT: Structure & Milestones

• National Soil Pollutants Database• Is based on a ‘field-tested’ cantonal solution• Has multi-client functionality:

• Closed data domains• Different user types (FABO, nonFABO, .edu,...)

• Connection to GIS software• Seperate development of ‘R modules’ to facilitate

spatial assessments based on point data• Begin development: early 2008• (Scheduled) begin of productive stage: early 2009

12 Soil News from Switzerland | EEA workshop on Soil, 18:09:2007Fabio Wegmann, Swiss Federal Office for the Environment

NABODAT: Data types & functionality

13 Soil News from Switzerland | EEA workshop on Soil, 18:09:2007Fabio Wegmann, Swiss Federal Office for the Environment

Digital soil mapping: regional background concentrations of heavy metals in the top soil