Assessment of the resilience and resistance of remediated soils using denitrification as model process

Purpose Soil contamination by pollutants is increasing, urging for remediation strategies but little is known about the functional sustainability of these strategies. Materials and methods We assessed the resistance and resistance of a microbial respiratory process, denitrification, to two different levels of heat-drought disturbances among (1) thermally treated industrial soil, (2) constructed Technosol made of thermally treated soil, compost, and paper by products, and (3) an arable soil. Results and discussion We showed that thermal remediation lead to low resistance and resilience after disturbances. However, addition of compost and paper mill sludge improved the stability. Conclusions This work underlines the relevance of resistance and resilience ecological concepts for assessing remediation strategies.