Description of PAS 115:2021 2021

This PAS specifies requirements for the generation of soils and soil amendments through treatment of road sweepings and inert gully waste [10]. It covers requirements for the sorting of material type, size, and quality, including levels of fertility, for the purpose of future use as soils.

The PAS defines requirements for a Quality Management System (QMS) for the generation of soils and soil amendments. It also requires a Safety and Quality Control System, including Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) assessment, which the user takes into account when developing, implementing and reviewing the QMS.

NOTE 1 HACCP assessment identifies relevant hazards and establishes critical control points (CCP) and critical limits (CL) for ensuring that any risks associated with material use are controlled within acceptable limits. HACCP therefore sets a precautionary barrier to gully and road sweepings being ‘blended' to dilute pollutants by ensuring the contamination levels in the end material from the PAS being below the relevant standards for the critical pollutants in their own right.

The PAS adopts a process of Hazard Assessment for the types of pollutant that is encountered in road gully and road sweepings. The PAS process defines CCP to maximize the possibility that the levels of the specified pollutants if used as the sole component for a soil, present no significant risk linked to the specified pollutants on the types of plants or users of the land in which they are grown.

NOTE 2 The soil and soil amendments are intended principally, but not exclusively, for use as soils in providing physical support, drainage and nutrients to trees and shrubs in challenging built-up environments, where requirements for growth can be very demanding. The use of such soils in, for instance, the support of street trees, would help meet street tree planting programmes and reduce the demand for virgin materials.

This PAS does not:

1. demonstrate a material has achieved End of Waste;
2. stipulate the means of collection;
3. cover the process of extraction where washing is not used;
4. guarantee “performance” of the soils or soil amendment;
5. exempt the materials from waste management regulations; and
6. specify soils or soil amendments suitable for the growth of plants intended for animal or human consumption or for use on agricultural land.

This PAS is for use by waste recycling/management companies but also benefits product-sorting companies and end users such as Local Authorities, highways authorities, landscape architects and landscape contractors.

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