Task areas What are the tasks of the new SCG? And how does it work? Put briefly, the SCG has three tasks: 1) A legal responsibility based on the Wet Bodem Bescherming (WBB: Dutch Soil Protection Act),the Wet Milieubeheer (WM: Dutch Environmental Management Act) and the Wet Belastingen op Milieugrondslag (WBM: Dutch Environmentally Based Tax Assessment).   In the past the SCG gave binding advice on how a certain batch of soil had to be remediated. This task has been nullified because the gap between tariffs for landfilling and determination is closing. Moreover, landfilling of treatable soil is prohibited by law. Therefore the SCG is now the institution that issues certificates stating that soil should be treated.     2) Facilitating authorities.   In the past, the SCG commissioned soil treatment activities. Now the SCG mainly assists provinces and local councils, that, within the context of decentralisation, have become responsible for ensuring that soil treatment is carried out responsibly. Here the SCG supplies tailored solutions. Its task can be limited to giving advice with respect to the commissioning strategy, the cost/quality evaluation and the drafting of a treatment specification. For more complex projects the SCG can be involved in all of the management activities from the commissioning procedure through to supervising soil treatment. The SCG maintains a digital (website) information point.     3) Soil quality assurance   In the 'nineties, it became apparent that contaminated soil was not being handled in the manner prescribed by the Soil Protection Act. The decentralised responsibility for decontamination has resulted in strengthening the need for (guaranteed) quality in the soil sector. Therefore, the SCG offers the possibility of, on a project basis, (to assist) developing instruments that contribute to the quality of soil treatment and of the soil streams themselves (via inspection, certification and registration of individual batches of soil). Some concrete plans: the SCG wants to contribute to an improved interpretation of (in-situ) soil investigation to extracted batches of soil (ex-situ) and to the standardisation of the prequalification of batches of soil. The SCG is also striving for nationally accepted regulations with respect to the determination of the quality of the decontamination processes. The SCG will maintain and update the resulting instruments.