Articles
Desealing soils to promote ecosystem services: an in situ experimental device
Article number
1374_15
Pages
117 – 124
Language
English
Abstract
Urban soil sealing is one of the main causes of soil degradation in Europe.
It increases the risk of flooding and has negative effects on biodiversity, quality of life and microclimate.
Many unsealing operations are conducted in an empirical way to refresh the city.
These are often realized without any strategy regarding new knowledge acquisition and especially on the capacity of the uncovered soils to acquire a multifunctional state without environmental risk.
The project developed in three French cities with contrasting climates aims to study the physico-chemical and biological characteristics of Technosols after unsealing to develop green spaces.
In each site, three modalities with an increasing degree of intervention were set up on three contiguous plots.
The common desealing operation consisted in cutting and removing the impervious top cover.
The soil underneath (up to 40 cm) was then either i) left unmodified, ii) decompacted with or iii) without organic amendment or iv) replaced by a mixture of topsoil and organic amendment, considered as reference practice (control). All treatments were vegetated with a similar grass cover.
The initial Technosols were described with soil and root profiles.
Soil fertility, microbiological activity, infiltration properties and capacity to support vegetation are characterized and followed over two consecutive years through regular soil sampling and analysis (i.e., agronomic properties, contaminants contents), vegetation cover characterization and biological activity (i.e., tea bag index method). In addition, dedicated probes installed in autumn 2022 will monitor daily soil temperature and moisture.
This note presents the methodology developed in this pioneering approach for a sustainable urban land use management.
It increases the risk of flooding and has negative effects on biodiversity, quality of life and microclimate.
Many unsealing operations are conducted in an empirical way to refresh the city.
These are often realized without any strategy regarding new knowledge acquisition and especially on the capacity of the uncovered soils to acquire a multifunctional state without environmental risk.
The project developed in three French cities with contrasting climates aims to study the physico-chemical and biological characteristics of Technosols after unsealing to develop green spaces.
In each site, three modalities with an increasing degree of intervention were set up on three contiguous plots.
The common desealing operation consisted in cutting and removing the impervious top cover.
The soil underneath (up to 40 cm) was then either i) left unmodified, ii) decompacted with or iii) without organic amendment or iv) replaced by a mixture of topsoil and organic amendment, considered as reference practice (control). All treatments were vegetated with a similar grass cover.
The initial Technosols were described with soil and root profiles.
Soil fertility, microbiological activity, infiltration properties and capacity to support vegetation are characterized and followed over two consecutive years through regular soil sampling and analysis (i.e., agronomic properties, contaminants contents), vegetation cover characterization and biological activity (i.e., tea bag index method). In addition, dedicated probes installed in autumn 2022 will monitor daily soil temperature and moisture.
This note presents the methodology developed in this pioneering approach for a sustainable urban land use management.
Authors
C. Vieillard, L. Vidal-Beaudet, R. Dagois, S. Ouvrard, C. Schwartz
Keywords
desealing, urban soils, soil fertility, urban ecology
Online Articles (28)