Clean soilPolluted soils are another risk

Jussieu (Paris): the construction of campus renovation, begun in 1997, has reached, eleven years later, as two thirds of its objective. Valérie Pécresse, the Minister of advanced education, says that it will be completed "by the end of 2011", namely asbestos removal requires, with two years of delay on initial forecasts.

First Paris Crown: a public developer had built social housing on the site of a former petrol station. In the spring of 2008, toxic fumes rise to the surface. The site is immediately arrested. Time to install pollution control system and a vented crawl space, two months have elapsed.

Nantes: on 14 August, a mortar projectile is found on the construction site of the future House of detention. In early September, is an 88 mm shell, and then another 155 mm which are updated. Good fisheries are cycled through and 51 gear later, the prefect ordered the work stoppage. Consequence: including delay between 3 and 6 months for delivery of the building initially scheduled for 2010.

Future hypermarket Carrefour to Moissac (Tarn-et-Garonne): in July of this year, earthwork reveal a large set built in a large Gallo-Roman rural domain. The site is then frozen to allow archaeologists to work. It is expected to resume in November for completion in June 2009.

These four examples, like hundreds of others each year, what may be termed the building at risk. Risks incurred by staff are working and the shoreline. But also by owners and developers, who may fear for the profitability of their operations.

Asbestos to renovate

Prohibited in new facilities since 1996, asbestos is not less present in buildings constructed in the meantime since the 1950s. But as long as they are not the subject of renovation or carcinogenic material is not degraded within limits set by regulations, nothing requires the owners to take specific measures of treatment or removal. "They still have obligations of identification, says Christian Cochet, responsible for the health division of the Centre for scientific and technical building (CSTB). Thus, when any real estate transaction, they must be able to present asbestos diagnostics they did establish. Owners must also be complete before work or before demolition so that the companies which will later speak on buildings to assess risks to their employees.

When a contracting authority discovered that regulation imposes to the work in its building, it must choose between two options: remove asbestos or treat it. If other than the case of the demolition of a building, which still requires a prior removal operation, several technical solutions are possible: the application of a binder or waterproof coating, heart impregnation spray, the crib or removal. The first is of limited effectiveness. Impregnation requires that no mechanical attack Vienna weaken its performance. The crib exposes to risks of pollution during the work. For removal, it is recommended when equipment containing asbestos is very deteriorated or located in areas which are the subject of frequent interventions.

The programme of renovation of the oldest towers in the defence commenced in 1993 date back to the 1960s , their asbestos is operated as its progress. "Having been on approximately 1 million meters square, it is almost completed, announces Hervé Bonnat, Director of communication of the public establishment of development of the defence (Epad).". The last concerned tower was the last few months, the GAN. It remains to deal with as few technical galleries.

Another tour, this time in Paris intramural, is still in work. "With the exception of certain infrastructures as technical duct and basements, the last three trays will be any next year, promises Sophie Giuglaris, operational Director of the entire real estate Tour Maine-Montparnasse (EITMM) on behalf of Icade." They will thus be 46 floors already treated and renovated. "This renovation, decided at the end of 2005 by the co-owners of the tower including MMA, the MGEN, Morgan Stanley and AXA, will cost EUR 2 million per level, including approximately 800,000 for single asbestos. "Anyway, if they wanted to find tenants, they had no choice, recognizes the trustee. To reflect the cost of the work on the rents, this is possible only within the limits of the market price. "The price ranged from 390 to 500 euros per year and per metre square rental and

Clean soil

Polluted soils are another risk. It is all the more important that vendors of land did not at present, the duty to present to the purchasers of the certificates of decontamination. "Is be notified in advance and take them into account as early as the design of the work to build, it is not a problem," provides Claude Cédou, President of the Professional Union of enterprises in remediation of sites (UPDS). Two cases may arise. If the field was the seat of a CBPI (installation classified for the protection of the environment), the seller is forced before the surrender of the clean up according to rules related to the use that will be done (residential, offices, tertiary, activities, schools, crèches, hospitals). Otherwise, for example if it ignores what could be the former use of the site, it uses an Office of specialized studies which will lead the investigations from aerial photographs, archives and investigations of neighbourhood, or, later, by analyzing the field.

This work may last from 3 months to 1 year. "To avoid falling behind, the contracting authority can carry it in parallel with studies of its real estate project." "And pollution, it can eliminate the source in the confining provisionally," reassures the President of UDPS responsible for the development of sites and Brézillon polluted soils, a subsidiary of Bouygues building Ile-de-France.

Dominique Goudard, Deputy Director General of Altarea France, acknowledges: "in view of the scarcity of land, we intervene in on former industrial sites, so often more frequently polluted.". He cited the case of project Okabé in Courbevoie, in the Paris suburbs: 4 levels of basement, shopping centre 3 and 5 offices, all on 75,000 m2 deliverables in March 2010. Built on a former industrial deli geo plant, it required studies and preliminary analyses, historic first a month of work and then survey four additional weeks. "As you might expect, we found in some areas of soil polluted by hydrocarbons." "After have sorted them, we did carry waste in appropriate landfill", continues this leader of the promoter, "because our operations often take place in the downtown", was also broken to the problems of asbestos and the unsealed.

Although they pose no risk to the health of the staff of construction and future users of the buildings to erect, roadworks conducted on archaeological sites are a problem. Thus, the proponent Elite Invest and civil society of real estate investment Patio Mont d'Or, which provided for an operation in Lyon, saw, on July 24, the Council of State set aside the order of the tribunal. The latter gave the prefect of imposing a protective search wrong. The reason: the presence of a burial grounds dating from the 1st century.

The rule of archaeology

Jean-Claude Mathis, Member of the dawn, is concerned. In an oral question to the Government on June 24, 2008, he regrets that "fault of means and without obligation to conduct searches in a given period, Inrap (national Institute for preventive archaeological research) sentence to perform all operations before it". For him, "the uncertainty on the timing of implementation operations induced costs risk and challenge of critical projects in terms of housing, job creation and economic development". Subject: a 105 housing project led by dawn estate, the ex-Opac of the Department.

Dominique Goudard complained also of the difficulty of the Inrap to fulfil its mandate within a reasonable time: "this was especially the case on one of our sites in Champagne-Ardenne, when this organization was fully mobilized by the project of construction of the TGVEst.". Today, in light of the recession of real estate and the end of major structuring public works projects, the situation should improve.

More dangerous are the soil in which are buried, since the two last world wars of the ammunition that did not explode. Each year, the army, civil security and the half dozen licensed private companies to harvest between 400 and 450 tons, including 25 tonnes of chemical gear. And it would be still 1.2 million tonnes. "In the early 2000s, the owners were still not really this risk into account," says Dominic plum-Jacquelin, Associate Manager of Berenger clean-up, a small company specializing in the pyrotechnic depollution. Up to the point where earthmoving companies and insurers have begun to accept work on of former battlefields without prior detection.