The world needs topsoil
How to recover and reuse
most of the soil on different construction sites.
The
world could run out of topsoil - in about 60 years if we continue to degrade it
at the current rate.
In the European Parliament,
the first steps for preservation have been taken with the approval of the
Nature Restoration Law (NRL), a Regulation that provides for the restoration of
at least 30% of natural habitats, and the increase of urban green spaces by
2030.
What
impact do construction sites have in preserving the soil?
Removing the topsoil to
allow for infrastructure construction is standard practice. Excavated earth is
usually classified as waste, but it ceases to be waste if it is fully
recovered. Recycling and reusing the soil becomes essential not only to save
the costs associated with disposal and the potential repurchase of new
material, but also to prevent the contamination of the soil with materials from
other areas.
With MB Crusher attachments
installed on heavy equipment already present on site, material management
becomes easier, more sustainable, and economically in terms of time.
Invasive
weeds leave Versailles
At the western end of the
Château de Versailles, France, right on the edge of the Gally Gardens, a 20,000
lbs. Mecalac excavator works in the materials storage depot. An MB-S10
Screening Bucket is installed at the end of its boom. "We needed to sift
the excavated material to gather soil and compost to arrange the flower beds
and lawns of the Gardens – says Joël Fauvel, Deputy Director of the Department
of Gardens of Trianon and Marly - Before our gardeners had to manually load the
excavated soil on a mechanical sieve mounted on a frame. Now with the MB
Crusher Screening Bucket, separating the materials is much easier and
faster."
The most important thing –
continues Fauvel – is that the soil processed with the MB Screening Bucket has
a better quality as it contains fewer weed roots and purity is essential to be
able to reuse it. Now the soil that returns to the ground is much cleaner.
Going
back to where you came from
There are as many as 9
miles of excavations to be filled during the installation of aqueducts and
sewage networks in a small Peruvian community – El Porvenir. Using the same
excavated material for bedding is beneficial for the construction site, but
more importantly, it benefits the environment. A challenging task during the
rainy season is processing the excavated material when it is wet. The problem
was solved by installing an MB Crusher MB-HDS212 Padding Bucket on a Bobcat
mini-excavator already on site. The advantages: no need to buy filling
materials, no truck trips to and from the construction site, and the extracted
soil returns – clean - to its place.
Everything
is locally sourced
During excavation work, the
soil is often mixed with branches, stones, roots, and other
"contaminating" materials. Why send everything to a landfill? With
the MB-HDS Padding Bucket you can easily and quickly separate impurities from
the earth, and then reuse the soil. In Germany, a construction site had this
exact problem: the nearest landfill was about 22 miles away and this would
result in an increase in time and costs. The problem was solved by using an
MB-HDS207 Padding Bucket to screen the material and separate the soil from the
stones, and roots.
The environment functions
like an organism: a single local intervention can have consequences for the
entire system. If this balance is disrupted, the entire system is at risk of
being destroyed.
How can you help? By simply
processing the excavated earth with MB Crusher equipment to obtain
"clean" soil, facilitate on-site operations and contribute to
environmental protection. And all you have to do is use the equipment already
on the job site.