The term “contaminated site” refers to all those areas in which, following previous or ongoing human activities, an alteration of the qualitative characteristics of the soil, subsoil and groundwater environmental matrices has been ascertained such as to represent a risk to human health.
The national legislation regarding the remediation of contaminated sites, introduced with the Ministerial Decree 471/99, was profoundly modified by Legislative Decree. 152/06 e ss.mm.ii. “Regulations on environmental matters” which, in Part Four, Title V “Reclamation of contaminated sites”, regulates the remediation and environmental restoration interventions of contaminated sites and defines the procedures, criteria and methods for carrying out the operations necessary for the elimination of the sources of pollution and in any case for the reduction of the concentrations of polluting substances, in harmony with community principles and regulations.

The CRISP interdepartmental center also carries out research activities in this sector, in particular with regard to new methods for the identification, characterization and detailed-scale mapping of polluted sites.