Table 5.5 - Estimated area of point sources and contaminated land in Europe

Source: See table

Source Landuse (km2) Potentially contaminated area (km2)
Built-up area (incl housing, industry, traffic area) 100 000­200 0001 24 000­48 0002
Mining area (incl mining industries & spoil dumps) 50 000­100 0003 15 000­30 0004
Military sites 12 000­24 0005 7200­14 4006
Landfills 2000­45007 1200­27008
Total - 47 400­95 100

The area of potentially contaminated sites has been estimated assuming the following:

  1. 1 per cent of the European territory (which is 10.2 million km2) is urban (Velde et al, in press). The total built-up area (including industry, roads, airports, etc) is taken to be twice that.
  2. 20 per cent of the built-up area is industrial and 20 per cent of this is seriously polluted. Further, dispersion of contaminants increases this area by a factor of six.
  3. Estimated from extrapolation of a few national landuse statistics available (including metal, salt and coal mines and mining waste disposal sites).
  4. 5 per cent of the mining area has polluted groundwater and dispersion increases this area by a factor of 6.
  5. Extrapolated from national statistics of The Netherlands and Switzerland.
  6. The groundwater is polluted below 10 per cent of the military sites. Dispersion assumption as above.
  7. Dutch figures indicate that there are 100 km2 of landfills in The Netherlands (population 15 million). For the European population of 680 million this equals 4500 km2. This estimate is taken as the maximum due to generation of less municipal waste in Eastern European countries as compared to Western countries.
  8. The groundwater is polluted below 10 per cent of landfills. Dispersion characteristics as above.