Effective pollutant retention capacity of permeable pavements for infiltrated road runoffs determined by laboratory tests.

The infiltration of urban runoff always implies an entrance of pollutants into the soil and ground water. Due to legal regulations in many communes there is no longer any permission needed for stormwater infiltration, if administrative regulations and the requirements of standards are observed. The results of a research project carried out under the heading "Development of an assessment procedure for permeable pavements" show, that the pollutant retention capacity of permeable pavements varies considerably, depending on the material and the specific reactive surface. The objective of the study was to work out recommendations of suitable permeable pavements for different types of urban runoff. Selected data about the quality of urban runoff was compiled into a runoff matrix, which was used for defining characteristic dilutions. In batch tests, the material of the infiltration devices is penetrated with the dilutions. A test installation in large scale is used to calibrate the sorption coefficients derived from the batch experiment.