IADC: Facts About Selecting a Destination for Dredged Material (The Netherlands)

Finding a suitable destination for dredged material can be challenging. Although most dredged material is clean, people’s pre-conceptions about the quality of dredged material are often quite negative. The discussion, the pros and cons, about where and when dredged material can be used or placed is often a long, drawn-out procedure.

So starting to evaluate the possibilities early on in the project’s planning process is essential to avoiding serious conflicts, protests and legal delays, which can ultimately jeopardise the success of the project.

This executive summary gives an overview of when and how to start considering and analysing the uses, the placement or disposal of dredged material. The type of material, the potential use of the material, the distance to a suitable placement site, the mode of transportation to the placement site, the possibility of dredged material treatment – all these aspects have financial and environmental consequences.

The summary also outlines the three basic solutions for the destination of dredged material. It introduces some new low-cost technologies and flexible strategies for dealing with dredged material; and it explains some of the regulations and responsibilities when determining the destination of the material.

It also raises the question of who should be involved in the decision-making process: Whilst project owners, consultants and dredging contractors may have the scientific and technical knowledge, stakeholders – including the public – have a vested interest in what happens in their ‘backyard’.

Informing the public and working to change attitudes about the perception of dredged material as a waste should be a number one priority. Communication and explanation can go a long way toward making a difficult task a bit easier – and thereby making the right choices about an important part of the dredging operation.

Facts About Selecting a Destination for Dredged Material

IADC stands for “International Association of Dredging Companies” and is the global umbrella organisation for contractors in the private dredging industry. As such IADC is dedicated to promoting the skills, integrity and reliability of its members, as well as the contributions of the dredging industry to worldwide prosperity in general. IADC has over one hundred main and associated members. Together they represent the forefront of the dredging industry.

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Dredging Today Staff, April 16, 2012; Image: iadc-dredging