Initial Soil State Report (ISSR)

With the entry into force of the Industrial Emissions Directive 2010/75/EU of the European Parliament (IED), operators of so-called „IE facilities“ are obliged to prepare an initial soil state report for soil and groundwater (ISSR) as part of the approval of a plant.

 

 

The ISSR is a necessary part of the notice of approval for the statutory obligation to return the site to the state established in the ISSR in accordance with Section 5 Paragraph 4 of the Federal Immission Control Act (BImSchG). Its purpose is to document the chemical condition of soil and groundwater on the installation site as initial state before the commissioning of a new or modified plant.
The state according to the ISSR must be the same as before or it must be restored by the operator after a plant shutdown.

An ISSR is necessary in principle if the following requirements are met:

• An application for the modification or re-approval of an existing plant in accordance with the IED has been submitted. The plants concerned are listed in Annex I of the 4th BImSchV.
• Any relevant hazardous substances/mixtures (according to the CLP Regulation) of material or quantitative relevance which are used, produced or released by the plant are listed in the Annex.
• Due to the relevant hazardous substances/mixtures used, contamination of the soil or groundwater cannot be excluded with absolute certainty.