| Aquatic sediments in industrialized countries often are highly polluted. This includes sediments in rivers, ditches, harbors and sedimentation areas like flood plains in The Netherlands. The high costs for remediation of such polluted sediments often lead to stagnation of maintenance of the water system and beneficial reuse of sediments, for instance for the construction of infrastructural works. Recently it was shown that naturally occurring particles in sediment such as black carbon (BC), are able to bind organic pollutants very effectively [5,6].This binding is similar to that to activated carbons (AC) as used in many water-cleaning technologies, and reduces the risks towards aquatic organisms as well as the risks of transport and leaching of contaminants. On the other hand, BC/AC additions also may bind nutritious organic compounds leading to deterioration of habitat. The current proposal is meant to develop knowledge and technology to (a) improve risk assessment and decision support with respect to contaminated sediments, (b) decrease the costs of sediment cleaning1 and favor its reuse as building material (c) take away public resistance against sediment depots and (d) reduce risks caused by polluted sediment sites. |
