ABSTRACT
There are many challenges in deriving ecologically based soil quality standards (SQSs) for trace elements (TEs) in soils due to the variable nature of soils across sites, regions, and continents and due to the variable nature of the ecological endpoints that need to be protected. Different jurisdictions use different terminology for SQS, e.g., soil screening values, ecological investigation levels, maximum permitted concentrations, trigger values, etc., but in this chapter we will use the term SQS and define it to mean a threshold concentration of TE in soil above which some action is required (e.g., further investigation, toxicity assessment, remediation, etc.) (Chapter 4). Generally, the preferred use of SQSs is to trigger further investigation, and risk management is usually only triggered following further investigation and derivation of site-or land use-specific SQSs against which the dose is compared (Carlon 2007).
