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Living with Sediments

The living with sediments project started in 2006 and is sponsored by the a research program on water issues, called 扡iving with water?(www.levenmetwater.nl). Together with different consortium partners TNO (www.tno.nl), the Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research, is shaping the project. The living with sediment project starts from the notion that sediment management has become a complex issue. This complexity has different dimensions:

The perception of sediments is generally negative. Sediment is often perceived as a waste or as a substance that poses a risk to health and environment;

The sediment issue has an impact on the interest of multiple stakeholders (for example farmers, shipping and environmental organizations). Those stakeholders are generally not involved in formulation of the problem, solutions or policy measures;

Legislation in the Netherlands concerning sediment management is quite strict. Due to this legislation the perception of sediment as a waste or a 憈oxic substance?is maintained and the costs of disposal of polluted dredged material are high;

The distribution of responsibilities over different involved institutions is complex. For instance, polluted sediment cannot always be contained in the area where has been dredged (a policy principle in the Netherlands). This means that dredged material has to be deposited in another area, causing 憈he problem?to move between institutional boundaries.

(Source: http://www.levenmetbagger.nl/)