Water-sensitive practices for soil health focus on strengthening the relationship between soil and water systems to improve resilience, ecosystem functioning, and spatial quality. They aim to create a synergy between soil and water systems. They support ecosystem services, improve the quality and availability of water resources, provide a healthy foundation for terrestrial and aquatic life, and enhance the long-term resilience and sustainability of landscapes.
Recommendations for Implementation
Water-sensitive soil solutions can be grouped according to how they use or protect soil functions to manage water quality, water quantity, ecosystem health, and spatial resilience.
Solutions that improve water quality: they use soil as a natural filter while preventing soils from becoming a source of pollution
- Soil-based water purification solutions: constructed wetlands, rain gardens and bioretention filters, Bioremediation and phytoremediation, Monitoring natural attenuation and contaminant reduction processes
- Solutions that prevent soil pollution from spreading through water: avoiding soil disturbance and de-sealing in contaminated areas, using soil amendments (e.g., biochar, activated carbon) to immobilise contaminants, permeable reactive barriers to contain and treat groundwater pollution, phytohydraulics, using vegetation to control groundwater movement and support contaminant degradation
Solutions that manage water quantity: they enhance soil capacity to absorb, store, and regulate water, reducing both flooding and drought risks.
- Increasing infiltration and water storage: protecting open and permeable soils, reducing soil sealing and land take through de-sealing, creating green spaces and green corridors, using permeable surfaces, managed aquifer recharge through infiltration basins, recharge wells, and underground storage systems
- Using landscape morphology for flood protection: floodplains and restored river areas, bioswales and bioretention areas, terraces, slopes, dikes, and dune systems
- Restoring soil permeability and structure: Sustainable urban drainage systems (SUDS), soil decompaction and soil structure improvement
Solutions that strengthen soil–water ecosystems and landscape resilience: they work with natural soil and water dynamics to support biodiversity, climate adaptation, and spatial quality.
- Restoring natural water landscapes: river and stream renaturation, salt marsh restoration, sandy shore and dune systems, mangrove restoration
- Creating healthy ecosystems: natural wetlands, urban forests, urban farming systems
- Integrating soil and water into the built environment: blue-green infrastructure, green roofs and green walls, constructed soils to improve soil performance
Solutions that improve water storage and freshwater resilience: they use soil and groundwater systems as strategic water reserves. They include: underground water storage in suitable soil layers, aquifer buffer systems to secure freshwater supplies or measures that maintain groundwater levels and reduce salinisation risks caused by sea-level rise.
Solutions for soil stability and geotechnical resilience: they address challenges related to soft soils, groundwater changes, and land subsidence.
- Alternative building site preparation methods
- Maintaining groundwater levels and avoiding excessive drainage
- Nature-based slope stabilisation using vegetation and water management
- Hydro-geotechnical solutions, such as foundations and ground improvements that reduce subsidence while protecting groundwater-dependent ecosystems