South Korea to revise Rules for Soil Environment Conservation Act to relax soil pollution standards and remediation standards

On August 30, 2024, the Ministry of Environment of South Korea published a draft revision of the Enforcement Rules of the Soil Environment Conservation Act and began soliciting public comments through October 14, 2024. The purpose of the proposed revisions is to relax the soil pollution standards (i.e., soil pollution concern standards and soil pollution countermeasure standards) for fluorine in soil, and to allow the relocation of contaminated soil for remediation.

The key revisions proposed are as follows.