Environmental impacts of soil remediation activities: quantitative and qualitative tools applied on three case studies

•CO2 emissions of soil remediation result primarily from the use of fossil fuels.•The carbon footprint calculator developed in The Netherlands was the most user friendly tool.•Tools are useful to evaluate newer techniques, for which previous experience is lacking.•Development of tools should consider improvements in remediation technologies.

When evaluating remediation technologies for contaminated soil and groundwater, the beneficial effects of the remediation are mostly emphasized without consideration of the environmental impacts of the remediation activities themselves. Nevertheless, different qualitative and quantitative methods to estimate the environmental impacts of soil remediation activities are available. In the present study, three case studies were worked out, for which several remediation options were evaluated for a soil and groundwater contamination with mineral oil and benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylene, based on data of the soil remediation project itself or on data from pilot projects. The evaluation tools that were simultaneously used for all the case studies consisted of the ‘Best Available Technique not Entailing Excessive Costs’ method, a life cycle-based evaluation method and a CO2 calculator. The results highlight the most important aspects to take into account for the evaluation of the environmental footprint of soil remediation activities and provide a guidance for environmental impacts assessment within the framework of contaminated site management.