The work carried out during the reporting period has focused on establishing a scientific and technical foundation for understanding how soil pollution interacts with land use, soil management practices, and ecosystem functioning across multiple environmental compartments. Central to this effort has been i) the development and integration of advanced modelling approaches capable of simulating the fate and transport of a wide range of contaminants, alongside the processes that govern soil, water, and atmospheric interactions and ii) the development of a comprehensive set of scenarios combining land-use types, soil management practices, and environmental drivers.
A key achievement has been the initiation and parameterisation of state-of-the-art models to quantify how soil pollution affects soil functions and related ecosystem services. Using detailed datasets from well-characterised test sites, most notably in the Zelivka catchment, the Daisy and MIKE SHE models have been set up to simulate water balance, carbon and nitrogen cycling, and the behaviour of agrochemical compounds, including pesticides. These simulations provide insights into pollutant dynamics within soil profiles and their transfer to groundwater and surface water systems, forming a scientific basis for assessing impacts on soil processes and ecosystem services.
The project has advanced modelling frameworks to evaluate how soil pollution responds to changes in land use and management practices. Simulations of both conventional tillage and conservation agriculture have been completed in the Daisy model. Next steps in the work include the assessment of how shifts in agricultural practices influence pollutant mobility, soil health, and long-term sustainability. Modelling approaches addressing remediation strategies, such as the treatment of PFAS-contaminated soils, have been initiated, combining hydrological and geochemical models to better understand the effectiveness and implications of intervention measures.
One PHISHES scientific contribution lies in the development of integrated modelling approaches, including coupling of tools into “model trains”, capable of addressing diverse pollutant families, including agrochemicals, trace metals, and contaminants of emerging concern such as PFAS. Existing models are being extended and coupled to capture key processes, including pollutant sorption, transport under variable hydrological conditions, and interactions with soil properties. Enhancements to the Daisy model now allow for the simulation of PFAS behaviour in unsaturated soils, representing a step forward in modelling emerging contaminants. Complementary modelling efforts using tools such as Hydrus-PHREEQC, MODFLOW and MIKE SHE have further enabled the representation of pollutant dynamics across agricultural, urban, and contaminated environments.
To address the challenge of spatial scale, the project has made progress in developing model trains that link field-scale process understanding with catchment-scale dynamics. These coupled modelling systems will allow the simulation of pollutant transport across soil, groundwater, and surface water systems, supporting the analysis of how local processes translate into broader environmental impacts. This upscaling capability is essential for evaluating land management strategies and environmental drivers, including climate change, across realistic spatial contexts; work at the catchment scale will be a focus during the upcoming reporting periods.
In parallel, the foundations of an integrated digital simulation platform, the PHISHES Digital Platform or PDP, have been established. The platform is designed to provide access to data, models, and scenario outputs for a unified soil–water–atmosphere framework. The technical architecture of the platform has been defined, and key components have been implemented, including a cloud-based data repository and open-source tools for data access and processing. The development of a decision-support interface for translating complex modelling outputs into accessible, policy-relevant insights will be the focus of next steps. The PDP’s conceptual design is such that it ensures interoperability between datasets and models. Technical users download the information and tools they need, enabling them to produce their own analysis across multiple spatial scales for their areas of interest in Europe.
PHISHES has also established a comprehensive set of scenarios combining land-use types, soil management practices, and environmental drivers. These scenarios, developed in close coordination with modelling activities, provide a structured basis for exploring the effects of sustainable practices and restoration strategies across different test sites. Early work has begun on identifying relevant nature-based solutions and aligning scenario design with model capabilities, to promote relevance of model results for informing soil functions and associated ecosystem services.
Underlying the scientific advancement in PHISHES is the application of the model trains to diverse real-world test cases. Datasets have been compiled and monitoring systems strengthened in agricultural, urban, and contaminated environments, supporting model calibration and validation. These efforts have led to improved conceptual understanding of pollutant behaviour, including PFAS plume dynamics and the influence of hydrological variability. The combination of field observations, laboratory experiments, and modelling is a defining feature of the PHISHES project design and serves as an evidence base for scenario analysis and impact assessment.
Another aspect of the scientific progress achieved is collaboration with other research initiatives, particularly within the European soil research community. Engagement in the Soil Mission Clusters and with the PHISHES sister project SOILPROM has facilitated exchange on modelling approaches, communication, data integration, and the representation of soil functions and ecosystem services.
Overall, the outcomes of the actions undertaken include the deployment of advanced modelling tools, the development of integrated modelling frameworks across scales and pollutant types, the conceptual design of a digital platform, and the creation of scenario-based approaches for evaluating sustainable soil management. Together, these achievements provide a coherent and scientific foundation for the following phases of the PHISHES project, in which scenario simulations and impact assessments will be further developed to generate knowledge on soil pollution, soil functions, and ecosystem services under changing environmental and climatic conditions.
