Soil clean-up: lessons to remember

In the past, various attempts have been made to alter the microbial composi tion of the soil. Moreover, considerable effort has been devoted to develop mechanisms to control the soil (micro)biological processes. Currently, a n umber of novel and powerful strategies are proposed to optimise the microbi ota in order to achieve soil clean-up. Nevertheless. in practice the most r elevant approach is the so-called intrinsic remediation, which often corres ponds with minimal intervention. It is important for the scientist, the reg ulator and the practitioner to carefully weigh the social consequences of t reatment such as 'Isolating-controlling-monitoring' versus an approach base d on 'Binding and immobilization of the pollutants'. (C) 1999 Elsevier Scie nce Ltd. All rights reserved.