THE GUIDELINES ON VAPOUR MONITORING AT CONTAMINATED SITES OF THE NATIONAL SYSTEM FOR ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION. APPLICATION AFTER ONE YEAR FROM PUBLICATION

Abstract

Vapour monitoring (soil gas survey, flux measures, monitoring of ambient air) is increasingly used for contaminated sites management procedures. The National Working Group, GdL 9 bis, of the National System for Environmental Protection (SNPA) produced three technical documents (Guidelines) defining an harmonized procedure for the project and realization of monitoring campaigns, for the collection and analysis of vapour samples and for the use of field data in the assessment procedures. For sampling and analysis procedures (SNPA Guideline 15/2018 and SNPA Guideline 16/2018), the high added value of developing uniform national methodologies was recognized. However, the highly innovative approach for the use of monitoring data in site specific risk assessment introduced by Guideline 17/2018 has determined the need to establish a discussion between SNPA and private companies. This article details some aspects of the procedure that have been discussed in the table with companies. The discussion with companies pushed SNPA to work on the following critical issues: better clarify some aspects of the Guidelines for their correct application in the context of contaminated sites management procedures; increase the knowledge and dissemination of the technical contents of the Guidelines within the SNPA through training activities to have an homogeneous and effective application on national territory; disseminate the technical contents of the Guidelines also outside SNPA (by participating in Conferences and Seminars) in order to make the stakeholders involved in contaminated sites activities properly informed; monitor the application of the Guidelines both in Sites of National Interest (SIN) and in local managed sites in order to verify the impact of the new procedures and eventually to identify critical issues.

In order to disseminate the contents of the Guidelines within SNPA, a national training plan coordinated for the technical/scientific part by the National Working Group on vapour monitoring has been organized.

The application of the Guidelines to real cases (test of the procedure) both within the Sites of National Interest and in sites managed at regional/local level is also presented in this paper.

Results of real cases data collection showed that the guidelines application, to date, does not generally lead to significant critical issues, although it is noted that oil activities are the most concerned (as they represent the sites where the greatest number of monitoring is carried out). Conversely, the use of threshold values and site-specific risk assessment applied to vapour monitoring would seem to achieve the objective of saving resources and energy for not significant sites to concentrate them in cases where there could potentially be a problem. In order to consolidate these results, the National Working Group on vapour monitoring intends to make data collection on the application of the Guidelines stable and continuous, extending it to the whole national territory.