Soil characterisation

The CEN Technical Committee CEN/TC 345 "Characterisation of soil" positions its work as a support to the current EU Thematic Strategy on soils, and potential derived legislation, and the Sewage Sludge Directive. The work of CEN/TC 345 consists in a screening of the ISO collection of standards on soil analysis and sampling. Those international standards that will be recognised by the Committee as fulfilling the requirements of the European policy on soils will be proposed as European standards.

ECOS has been sending an expert to this committee since 2003 and has commissioned a study in 2003 to investigate the existing ISO standards on soils. The results of this study will be used to construct ECOS positions and make possible proposals to launch revisions of the ISO standards before they are approved as European documents. The main concern of ECOS is to ensure that only accurate methods are standardised. As the European Union has entered in the process of drafting and voting a Directive on soil protection, ECOS also remains vigilant that a clear distinction is kept between legislative and normative issues.