Clean-up of your own site
- Soil investigation and sampling
- Excavation, removal and backfilling
- Cleaning up groundwater
- Reinstatement of paving and planting
Environmental damage insurance for real estate
Environmental damage insurance pays the cost of clearing up soil and water contamination on your own plot and on other people's. Those are exactly the costs a liability policy leaves behind.
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The calculator and the quote form below are in Dutch. Prefer to do this in English? Email info@finassverzekert.nl or call 072 - 509 24 56 and we will take it from there.
Work out for yourself what it would cost.
Enter your details; you will receive a proposal within one working day.
- We compare the offerings of several insurers
- An adviser checks whether the cover suits your activities
- We arrange the switch, including cancellation
A premium indication, not personal advice. Prefer to talk it through? Call 072 - 509 24 56.
- Independent advice
- Several insurers
- Switching arranged
- Help with claims
In brief
Contamination of soil, groundwater or surface water almost always costs money in investigation and clean-up, even where nobody holds you liable for anything. Under the duty of care in the soil legislation, the authorities can require the contamination to be undone, and that bill lands with the owner or user of the plot. Environmental damage insurance was made for that: it insures your own costs, not your liability.
That distinction is the whole point. The public and employers' liability insurance (AVB) covers third-party injury and property damage, and either expressly excludes environmental damage or limits it to a sudden, unforeseen emission on someone else's land. Cleaning up your own ground is not a third party's loss and falls outside it by definition. Someone facing a claim from a neighbour under Article 6:162 of the Dutch Civil Code may well have cover, while the much larger costs on his own yard remain uninsured.
With real estate there is the added point that you rarely cause the contamination yourself. A tenant's leaking tank, a fire in which firefighting water runs into the ground, or a burst oil pipe all hit the owner. The policy therefore usually covers the your own site, the third-party site to which the contamination flows and the clean-up costs after a fire.
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What does environmental damage insurance cover?
The cover turns on three places where contamination causes costs: your own site, other people's, and the consequences of both.
Third-party sites
Contamination that has moved from your site to adjoining plots or into the surface water.
- Clean-up on someone else's land
- Contamination via ditch or sewer
- Costs recovered by the authorities
- Defence against claims from neighbours
Additional costs
The items that remain after the clean-up itself and are often forgotten.
- Clearance after fire or firefighting
- Costs of mitigating the loss to prevent worse
- Business interruption, only if separately included
- Loss of value stays outside
What is covered
| Situation | Basic | Extended |
|---|---|---|
| Sudden leak from an above-ground tank | Yes | Yes |
| Soil contamination after fire and firefighting water | Yes | Yes |
| Gradually leaking underground pipe | No | Provided that |
| Contamination running on to the neighbour's plot | Provided that | Yes |
| Contamination that was already there at purchase | No | No |
| Fall in the value of the plot after clean-up | No | No |
Which locations, substances and installations are actually included is set out in the policy conditions and on the policy schedule. The activities stated per address are decisive in that.
What does your premium depend on?
- Type of location and activity: storage and tanks weigh heavily
- Number of addresses: each location assessed separately
- Presence of tanks and pipework: underground is more expensive
- Type of cover chosen: sudden only, or gradual as well
- Sum insured and excess: a higher limit means a higher premium
- Soil conditions and surroundings: water table and proximity to water
Insurers weigh these details differently. That is where your saving is.
How we arrange it
- You request a quoteWe take stock of your situation, risk and wishes.
- We compareseveral insurers, on premium as well as conditions.
- You receive a proposalWith an explanation of the differences and the exclusions.
- We arrange the switchIncluding cancellation, so there is no gap in cover.
Why arrange it through Finass Verzekert?
We look at the terms as well as the premium, and stay your point of contact when there is a claim.
Independent
We are not tied to one insurer and compare on the basis of an objective analysis of several companies.
One fixed adviser
You call or email someone who knows your file. No menu options, no changing call centres.
Switching without hassle
We cancel your old policy and align the start date, so you are never a day without cover.
Help with claims
We report the claim and monitor how it is handled. In urgent cases you can reach us on the emergency line.
9.5New policy
9.8Claims handling
Customers rate our service on four aspects: personal service, service delivery, availability and the outcome. The reviews are collected and published by NH1816 and come from customers who have actually taken out a policy with Finass Advies B.V. or reported a claim.
Where things go wrong in practice
Four points that determine whether the clean-up bill ends up with the insurer or with you.
Sudden and gradual are two different worlds
Basic cover pays only in the case of a sudden, unforeseen event: a tank that cracks, a collision on the site, a fire. Contamination that has built up over months or years (a slowly leaking pipe, a porous floor beneath a storage area) falls outside it and calls for extended cover. Because leaks are often discovered only during excavation or on sale, this distinction is in practice the most decisive point of the policy.
The AVB is no safety net here
A AVB covers third-party injury and property damage and almost always contains an environmental exclusion; at most a limited cover remains for sudden contamination at someone else's site. Cleaning up your own soil is not a third party's loss and is therefore never covered. Buildings insurance, too, pays for the structure, not for the ground beneath it. Anyone holding both policies therefore leaves precisely the largest cost item uninsured without separate environmental cover.
What is not included
The following, among others, are outside the cover: existing contamination that was already present or known before the start date, asbestos and asbestos removal, damage caused by deliberately ignoring permit conditions or an enforcement notice, administrative fines and penalty payments, contamination from nuclear reactions, and the loss of value of the plot after a properly completed clean-up. Intent and recklessness are excluded under Article 7:952 of the Dutch Civil Code. Normal business emissions for which you hold a permit do not count as damage either.
Record the baseline situation and notify promptly
A baseline survey at purchase or when the policy is taken out determines later what is old and what is new. Without one, the argument about the start date is virtually impossible to win. What you state at inception about tanks, storage and earlier incidents falls under the duty of disclosure in Article 7:928 of the Dutch Civil Code; if that picture is wrong, the insurer can limit or refuse payment under Article 7:930 of the Dutch Civil Code. Report a leak, moreover, as soon as reasonably possible (Article 7:941 of the Dutch Civil Code) and do not start digging without consultation.
Frequently asked questions
This is what people ask us most.
Why is my AVB not enough?
Because the AVB covers liability and not your own costs. Environmental damage is moreover usually excluded from it, apart from limited cover for sudden contamination at third parties. Cleaning up your own soil is not another party's property damage and therefore always falls outside that policy, however high the sum insured.
As owner, am I liable for what a tenant causes?
In reality it is often the owner who is approached for the clean-up, because the owner has control over the plot. Whether you can recover the costs from the tenant depends on the lease and on evidence. So include tenants as insureds, or set out in the contract that they must maintain environmental cover of their own.
What happens to contamination that was already there?
It is not insured. Insurance covers uncertain future events, not an existing situation. If old contamination is only discovered after the start date, the survey report decides the outcome. A baseline measurement at inception is therefore not a formality but the evidence on which a claim later stands or falls.
Is soil contamination after a fire covered?
Usually yes, even under basic cover, because a fire is the very model of a sudden and unforeseen event. It then concerns contamination from firefighting water, soot and escaped substances. Do check whether the clearance costs also appear on the buildings or contents policy; double cover leads to argument about who pays what.
Does the policy also cover damage to the neighbour's crops or livestock?
Consequential loss to third parties runs in principle through your liability cover, not through the clean-up cover. Environmental damage insurance pays for clearing and reinstating soil and water, including on someone else's plot. For claims about lost yield or dead livestock, the AVB or an additional section is needed.
Every situation is different. For these situations we have a separate page.
- Compare environmental damage insuranceThe main page
- Environmental damage insurance for propertyClean-up costs, tenants, baseline situation
- Environmental damage insurance for a VvE (Dutch owners' association) through Avéro Achmea
- Environmental damage: soil contamination and clean-up costsSoil, firefighting water, clean-up
- VvE environmental damage insuranceFirefighting water, oil tank, clean-up costs
Read more
Within Milieuschadeverzekering
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Want to know what a clean-up could cost you?
Request a quote without obligation. We set out side by side, per insurer, what counts as sudden and what counts as gradual.
Prefer to call? 072 - 509 24 56, weekdays 09:00–17:00.
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About our service
Finass Verzekert is a trading name of Finass Advies B.V. We advise on and arrange non-life insurance on the basis of an objective analysis of several insurers, and receive commission for this from the insurer, which is included in the premium. You pay no separate advice fee. Before you take out cover, we establish your wishes and needs.
You will find our licence, KvK and Kifid details and our complaints procedure at the foot of every page.
This page was compiled by Finass Verzekert. Last updated on .
The information on this page is general in nature and is not personal advice.