Environmental consulting focuses on diagnosis, risk assessment and measurement planning. Environmental engineering designs and implements technical solutions. At ESOLVE we combine both areas to offer complete projects: from initial analysis to turnkey execution.

Royal Decree 9/2005, of 14 January: Establishes the list of potentially contaminating activities of the soil and the criteria/standards for the declaration of contaminated soils. It is the basic state standard that regulates contaminated soils and defines when it is mandatory to quantitatively assess their condition.

Royal Legislative Decree 1/2016, of 16 December, revised text of the Law on Integrated Contamination Prevention and Control (transposes and consolidates the IPPC/AAI regime into Spanish law). It defines the concept of the base report or the starting situation" and requires it to be provided to those activities that require an Integrated Environmental Authorisation (IAA).

Law 7/2022, of 8 April, on waste and contaminated soils in Spain for a circular economy, regulates obligations on contaminated soils, inventory, liability and corrective measures at the state level; It reinforces administrative obligations on land and connects with evaluation procedures when there is a change of use.

Royal Decree 665/2023, of 18 July, amending the Regulation of the Hydraulic Public Domain (RDPH, approved by RD 849/1986). It establishes for the first time in Spain generic quality values for groundwater, with concepts such as "Generic Non-Risk Value" (VGNR) and "Generic Intervention Value" (VGI) and regulates an administrative procedure for the declaration of aquifers contaminated by point sources and restoration (decontamination), and the obligations for those responsible for contamination.

Together with these state-wide regulations, it is necessary to consider those rules, regulations and technical criteria applied by each Autonomous Community and Hydrographic Confederation in the field of soil and groundwater.

Emerging contaminants are substances that are not always regulated but pose a risk to health and the environment. These include PFAS, certain drugs and persistent chemical compounds.

The Per and Polyfluoroalkyl compounds, called PFAS, is a family of more than 5,000 compounds that are chemically characterized by containing the Carbon-Fluorine bond, one of the most stable chemical bonds known, giving these compounds a high persistence in the environment and very low biodegradability.

PFAS began to be produced on a large scale in the 40s of the twentieth century and have been used in numerous applications, including waterproof textile finishes, non-stick kitchen utensils and fire foams.

The toxicity of PFAS is greater than some compounds such as benzene, a substance with carcinogenic effects. For this reason, the approval of regulatory values has been promoted to limit the presence of these contaminants in water and soil at concentrations at the centenary level of ppt (parts per trillion).

In the European Union, 23 PFAS have been included in the Drinking Water Directive, with maximum permissible limits of 0.1 for each compound individually and with a maximum permissible concentration of 0.5 for the sum of the 23 compounds.

At ESOLVE we develop R+D projects and technology aimed at the treatment of these compounds.

At ESOLVE we are committed to integrating conventional purification solutions and new treatment technologies to face the challenge of eliminating emerging contaminants from water.

The challenge is even greater when the project requires addressing a specific problem with temporary solutions in the short to medium term (such as the decontamination of the subsoil or the treatment of a volume of accumulated waste), with variable long-term needs associated with conventional treatment facilities.

The European Union Directive 2024/3019 on Urban Wastewater Treatment entered into force on 1 January 2025. It is expected that the transposition of the Directive will be carried out by means of a new regulation with the rank of law (in preparation).

The Directive seeks to adapt urban wastewater treatment to the objectives of the European Green Deal and put the environment at the centre of sanitation and purification policies, while also protecting human health, in line with the One Health approach.

Medicines for human use and cosmetic and personal hygiene products are groups of substances that are affected by this Directive (and the future Law).

Faced with the need to start facing the challenge of eliminating these compounds in water, ESOLVE is committed to putting into practice solutions for advanced chemical oxidation and electrooxidation (saline and electro Fenton).

To find out if a soil is contaminated, it is necessary to characterise it by excavating coves, drilling boreholes and installing piezometers to control groundwater and vapour collectors.

Samples of soils, water and gases from the subsoil are taken for analysis in the laboratory. If no contaminants are detected or are detected below the reference values defined in current regulations, it is accredited that the soil is in good condition.

Otherwise, a Quantitative Risk Analysis (RCA) must be carried out to determine whether any type of action to decontaminate or improve the subsoil needs to be carried out.

This process is key before changing land use, closing an industrial activity or carrying out real estate operations. See the section Environmental due diligence.

A Quantitative Risk Analysis (RCA) is a tool for calculating possible toxicological risks to human health or ecosystems, taking as starting data the conceptual model of the effect on the subsoil (defined with the previous characterization work) and certain exposure scenarios (current and future) characterized by the toxicological and physicochemical parameters of the contaminants, the parameters and routes of exposure and the characteristics of the receiver.

We have more than 25 years of experience in environmental consulting and engineering, with large-scale projects in soil and water decontamination throughout Spain.

We offer services throughout Spain, thanks to the regional certifications that validate us for this. In addition to offering immediate response capacity thanks to our mobile environmental treatment units and our own technical equipment.