High resolution mapping of soil geochemistry at a regional scale (Wallonia, South Belgium)

In many countries, government agencies rely on soil maps of trace metal background concentrations to implement soil protection policies. In Wallonia (South Belgium), regional regulation requires extremely detailed background concentration maps. The main obstacle to obtain these maps are the large variations in local background concentrations over short distances, mainly due to the high diversity of soil parent materials, and the atmospheric deposition of pollutants around former base metal smelters. Here we outline the developed methodology and we present an example of the achieved geochemical... Mehr ...