A. Rorsch Member of the TNO Board of Management Like all living creatures man has from the very outset influenced the environment. Initially, the traces of human activity were hardly noticeable and so were their effects on the equilibrium of the ecosystem as such. However, as soon as man learned how to use tools, he was able to influence his surroundings more drastically, and to proliferate more rapidly. As a matter of fact that is the time when things went wrong, because a process was started off which was to continue with ever-increasing speed and on an ever- increasing scale. The present...

W.A. de Jong President of TNO Until some decades ago man supposed that the resilience of the environment was unlimited. He thought he could draw heavily on nature with impunity and that he could infinitely dump his waste into the environment. We have come to know better now: virtually everyone is well aware that one cannot just go on burdening the environment of man, animal and plant to such an extent. TNO, the Netherlands Organization for Applied Scientific Research, is among those research institutions that are working on economically feasible solutions for pollution problems resulting from...

A. Rorsch TNO Board of Management In 1985 the Netherlands Organization for Applied Scientific Research TNO, in cooperation with the Netherlands Ministry for Housing, Physical Planning and the Environment, took the initiative for a conference on an important environmental problem: contaminated soil and groundwater. We named it, somewhat self-assured, the First International TNO Conference on Contaminated Soil. And indeed the contamination of soils and groundwater proved to be an environmental issue of such an extent that soon after the successful first conference, TNO started preparations for...

Five billion people, at present the world population, inevitably affect the quality of the environment. The general public in an increasing number of countries is getting more and more concerned about this deterioration in quality. As a result many people cast doubts upon the desirability of the increase in energy consumption, the production of superfluous goods, ever-growing waste flows, harmful emissions of industrial processes, and so on. Actually, no one can simply ignore these issues. For instance, the authorities could introduce more environmental legislation aiming at a healthy...

F. J. COLON Chairman of the Scientific Committee TNO Division of Technology for Society, APELDOORN, The NETHERLANDS Only these past few years have we gained an insight into the full extent of the problems associated with contaminated soils. The first efforts to take effective remedial action at contaminated sites were seriously hampered by the lack of experience, knowledge and technology. Fortunately, this handicap has been partly alleviated by the experience we have gained in the numerous cases we have had, and -unfortunately still have to deal with. This meeting on contaminated soil is the...

Towards sustainable land use Dr. P. Folstar, Member of the TNO Board of Management Dr. M. Popp, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Research Centre Karlsruhe (FZK) Ten years ago, in 1985, TNO initiated the First Conference on Contaminated Soil in Utrecht. At that time, a rather complete inventory of suspected contaminated sites existed in The Netherlands. Time had come to consider further actions for investigations, evaluation and remediation. This concern has been spreading ever since to other European countries and throughout the world. In particular, German scientists and authorities...

Proceedings of the Third International KfK/TNO Conference on Contaminated Soil, December 10-14, 1990, Karlsruhe, FRG