OPAL Soil Centre

Soil is one of the world’s most precious natural resources - help us find out more about it

Soil is vital for plants and for food production. It also provides a home for a vast array of life. Soil stores and filters water, and provides the important foundation for buildings. The world would be a very different place without it.

Despite all these vital functions, much less is known about soil than air or water. We need to build a greater understanding of soil so we can sustain its functions and tackle local and global environmental challenges.

OPAL Soil Centre research
The OPAL Soil Centre is coordinating an England-wide survey that launches in spring 2009, in addition to a series of other concurrent research projects. We hope to fill the gaps in our scientific knowledge and encourage more people to get their hands dirty making their own soil discoveries.

Get involved
We want local schools and community groups to visit our study plots and work alongside our scientists. You can get involved by taking measurements of soil quality and pollution, surveying soil-dwelling organisms and recording your findings online. The data will be compared with past records to explore how the soil environment is changing over time.

Inner-city pollution
We want to learn more about soil pollution - the sources, how it moves through the soil and how it affects soil quality.
We are working closely with the Environment Agency and the Natural History Museum and are focussing particularly on inner-city areas, where pollution has greatest impact. This research will help with the future management of biosolids recycling - returning nutrients and organic matter reclaimed from wastewater to the land as fertiliser.
 

Contact us
opalsoil [at] imperial [dot] ac [dot] uk

OPAL Soil Centre is led by Imperial College, London