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Local Authority subscription for the first year: £350+VAT (£402.50 including VAT at 15%) Local Authority renewal of subscription: £350+VAT (£402.50 including VAT at 15%)

Commercial subscription for the first year: £750+VAT (£862.50 including VAT at 15%) - includes 1 place on the Introduction to ATRISKsoil training course. Commercial renewal of subscription: £600+VAT (£690.00 including VAT at 15%)

Please note: For commercial subscribers the training course is a pre-requisite of subscribing to ATRISKsoil. It is not possible to subscribe at a lower rate if you do not wish to attend. In addition we highly recommend that Local Authorities attend a training course (cost: £200+VAT).

SSVs derived using CLEA v1.04 have been released for all ATRISKsoil land uses (residential with homegrown produce, residential without homegrown produce, commercial, allotments, parks, playing fields and open spaces) for a sandy loam and soil organic matter of 6% (as per the SGVs).

Please note: Toxicological information and non-standard land use technical justifications are in the process of being formatted and collated in a manner suitable for the website and shall be posted on the website as soon as possible.

If you wish to subscribe, please register on the website. We shall then send you an information letter and terms and conditions (if you need access ASAP your letter can be faxed or emailed). As soon as we receive your signed terms and conditions and a purchase order (by email, fax or post), or cheque (by post), we will be able to allocate you to the website.

Although we do not have a dedicated help desk, we will be happy to provide information to help with issues relating to passwords and access. We will also do our best to answer general queries relating directly to the derivation of the SSVs, with responses to common technical queries listed below. We will endeavour to answer access and password issues as soon as possible and in no longer than 5 working days, with a response to technical queries within 10 working days.

We cannot assist with any re-modelling or modelling you may be undertaking, or any queries specific to your site. If you need such advice, please contact Nicky Robinson for further information on our peer review, training and consultancy services. We currently offer CLEA Basic and Advanced training in partnership with CL:AIRE:

The Introduction to ATRISKsoil course is designed to show you where the SSVs may and may not be used together with their background, and therefore we recommend you attend a course as soon as possible following subscription. We have received excellent feedback from the course and delegates report that they find it very informative and many claim it exceeded their expectations.

Click here to login to view the sample data. You will then be transferred to the SSV Data area.

Please send an e-mail to webmaster@atrisksoil.co.uk with any questions you might have.

You will not be able to access the data until you have received an authorisation e-mail. Please wait for your e-mail, or contact a member of the team.

No, not at all. The confidentiality clauses are designed to prevent wholesale copying and distribution of the Soil Screening Values and supporting data to non-subscribers. It is felt that this could result in misapplication, and in due course the use of out of date values, as well as compromising Atkins intellectual property rights.

However, it is understood that to use these values in the manner intended (e.g. to appraise screening values quoted in reports, to appraise the need for site-specific DQRA, or to identify potential mistakes in approaches taken to risk assessment) there may be a need for a subscriber occasionally to present both specific SSVs and selected background information to a third party. This is why toxicological and modelling parameter information which supports the use of the SSVs is available to subscribers to the website. Such use of the information contained on the website would not be considered by Atkins to be a breach of the subscription agreement.

At any time in the future, when an SGV is published this will of course take precedence over the SSV, which has no formal status. An SGV will have been accepted by the Environment Agency and in addition the toxicological parameters will have been sanctioned by the Department of Health. The database will be amended to reflect this situation, i.e. the SSV will be removed and a note posted on the website. In addition, the SSVs for the non-standard land uses for each SGV contaminant will be updated using the SGV report and TOX report parameters.

This would depend on the exact circumstances, perhaps including whether the assessment was still in progress. Past experience suggests that it is unlikely that the release of an SGV would prompt a wholesale reassessment; for example, the currently available SGVs did not result in a wholesale re-evaluation of sites addressed prior to 2002. Also, there is no greater (and perhaps even less) a risk of this happening with the SSVs than there is with any other non-SGV screening criteria which are used to assess contamination.

The course is a pre-requisite of subscribing to ATRISKsoil. Please make every effort to attend the first possible training date.

The course costs £200+VAT (£230 including VAT at 15%) for each delegate who attends. Please request a booking form from linda lawrence, and return the form with a cheque or purchase order, to secure your place.

The course costs £200+VAT (£230 including VAT at 15%) for each delegate who attends. Please request a booking form from linda lawrence, and return the form with a cheque or purchase order, to secure your place.

We hold courses every few months and vary the location based on subscribers? locations. Common course locations include Epsom, Birmingham, Cardiff, Glasgow and London.

Unfortunately we are not able to send out course material. To obtain the course material, you will need to attend a course.

We make every effort to ensure all scheduled courses run. However, if delegate numbers are very low, we will have to cancel that date. We will cancel the date 2 weeks prior to the course, and will email/phone each delegate who is registered to attend.

Yes. Up to 2 weeks before the course you may cancel free of charge. If you cancel between 1 and 2 weeks before your course date you will only be refunded 50% of the course cost; and if you cancel less than 1 week before the course date you will not receive any refund. Therefore please notify us as soon as possible. These terms and conditions are detailed at the foot of your booking form.

A slight discrepancy for the vanadium oral MDI has been amended. This is not considered to be significant as the correct MDI does not change the residential with or without homegrown produce SSVs.

The Environment Agency SGVs for dioxins, furans and dioxin-like PCBs have been derived for a 'generic urban soil' and include consideration of additivity across the different congeners. This differs from the approach for the rest of the contaminants at present. Not all sites (e.g. former substations) will have soil which is representative of a 'generic urban soil' and in such instances, use of the dioxins, furans and dioxin-like PCBs SGV may not be sufficiently protective. Before using the dioxins, furans and dioxin-like PCBs SGV, users should consider the soil present on site and historical uses. Atkins therefore does not plan to release SSVs for dioxins, furans and dioxin-like PCBs in the near future to avoid accidental misuse.

The SGVs for cadmium, as released by the Environment Agency in July 2009, are based on a lifetime exposure. Atkins has therefore updated the 6% SOM sandy loam standard land use SSV sheets in the subscriber area for the SGVs. The SGVs have also been added to the 1% SOM sand standard land uses SSV sheets as the cadmium SGV will not change with soil type or SOM. CLEA v1.04 has been used to derive cadmium SSVs. It is understood that the difference between using CLEA v1.04 and CLEA v1.06 for cadmium is minimal. Should the Environment Agency release revised SGVs for cadmium using a more recent version of the software, Atkins will update the SSVs using the same software version.
We are currently in the process of going through the original research for the non-standard land uses to determine input parameters based on a lifetime exposure. Following the selection of these parameters and following appropriate QA/QC, the non-standard land uses will be modelled for cadmium. Following the full QA/QC process, SSV sheets will then be uploaded onto the website.

The majority of allotment users would be assumed to amend the soil to a SOM of greater than 1%. Therefore Atkins has not derived a SSV for allotments in the first instance. Subscribers should conduct analysis of SOM on any allotment sites they assess to establish that use of 6% sandy loam values are appropriate.
Should there be an identified need for playing fields SSVs for a 1% SOM sand, we will consider deriving these SSVs in the future.

Atkins have derived SSVs for a 6% SOM sandy loam and a 1% sand:

• The first set is derived using a soil organic matter (SOM) of 6% and a sandy loam soil. This approach is based on the revised CLEA methodology and is therefore also in line with the SGVs. For contaminants without a SGV, 6% sandy loam SSVs are available for the following land uses: residential with homegrown produce, allotments, commercial, residential without homegrown produce, parks, playing fields, open spaces.
• second set is based on a SOM of 1% and a sand soil. Made Ground on brownfield sites is often of a granular nature with a low SOM. Use of a 1% SOM and sand soil takes into account such conditions upon sites and comments we have received from subscribers. 1% SOM sand SSVs are available for contaminants with and without a SGV for the following land uses: residential with homegrown produce, commercial, residential without homegrown produce, parks, open spaces (see above for further information).

The newly derived chromium SSV is based on CrVI. The risk driving pathway is the inhalation of dust. As you can see from the difference between the residential with and residential without produce SSV, plant uptake also influences the SSV.

Atkins are considering developing a SSV for Cr(III). However, we also note that the Environment Agency intend to publish a SGV for chromium within the next few months (end of June 2009).

SSVs are designed to be used as an initial screening tool for land contamination assessment, including identification of sites where further assessment may be required to establish their status under Part 2A. However, it is considered likely that a more detailed study would be needed to support P2A determination of a site, for instance a full pollutant linkage assessment, toxicological assessment and/or DQRA. Additionally, unlike the SGVs, SSVs have no formal status.

Two ATRISKsoil SSVs have been derived for lead. One is termed threshold lead (and takes into account background exposure) and the other, termed non-threshold lead (which does not take into account background exposure). Although the toxicological effect is a non-threshold effect, Atkins understand that the Health Protection Agency (HPA) have in some site specific cases recommended that background exposure is also considered. The Environment Agency have yet to release the updated approach for lead and there is therefore some uncertainty in the approach. At present, we recommend that you consult with your regulator or the HPA for advice regarding your site and to whether or not you should consider background.

The SSVs have been derived using CLEA v1.04 which was released in January 2009. In September 2009 CLEA v1.05 was released. It is anticipated that the only change that will affect the SSVs resulting from the release of CLEA v1.05 will be a minor change to cadmium (for which the EA have already released cadmium SGVs).

CLEA v1.06 was released in October 2009 to fix a password issue affecting CLEA v1.05. This therefore does not affect the derivation of the SSVs.

This update is only relevant to the following PAHs: benzo(a)anthracene, benzo(a)pyrene, benzo(b)fluoranthene, benzo(g,h,i)perylene, benzo(k)fluoranthene, chrysene, dibenzo(ah)anthracene and indeno(1,2,3-c,d)pyrene.
Client/subscriber feedback has suggested revision of the oral toxicological approach would be preferred to make the generic screening values more conservative. Atkins has therefore updated SSVs for the above eight PAHs using toxicological data from the Environment Agency TOX Report 2¹.
Atkins considers that the previous toxicological approach would not cause any unacceptable risks to the receptor based on our interpretation of the SR2 guidance.
As per Atkins SSV approach, the PAH SSVs will be updated following the publication of any SGV or TOX report.
¹Defra and Environment Agency. TOX Report 2. Contaminants In Soil: Collation of Toxicological Data and Intake Values for Humans. Benzo(a)pyrene. 2002