As a result of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) crisis, meat and bone meal (MBM) production can no longer be used to feed cattle and must be safely disposed of or transformed. MBM specific incineration remains an alternative that could offer the opportunity to achieve both thermal valorization and solid waste recovery as ashes are calcium phosphate-rich material. The aim of this work is to evaluate ashes efficiency for in situ remediation of lead-contaminated aqueous solutions and soils, and to assess the bioavailability of lead using two biological models, amphibian Xenopus laevis larvae and Nicotiana tabaccum tobacco plant. With the amphibian model, no toxic or genotoxic effects of ashes are observed with concentrations from 0.1 to 5 g of ashes/L. If toxic and genotoxic effects of lead appear at concentration higher than 1 mg Pb/L (1 ppm), addition of only 100 mg of ashes/L neutralizes lead toxicity even with lead concentration up to 10 ppm. Chemical investigations (kinetics and X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis) reveals that lead is quickly immobilized as pyromorphite [Pb10O4(PO4)(6)(OH)(2)] and lead carbonate dihydrate [PbCO3 center dot 2H(2)O]. Tobacco experiments are realized on contaminated soils with 50, 100, 2000 and 10000 ppm of lead with and without ashes amendment (35.3 g ashes/kg of soil). Tobacco measurements show that plant elongation is bigger in an ashes-amended soil contaminated with 10 000 ppm of lead than on the reference soil alone. Tobacco model points out that ashes present two beneficial actions as they do not only neutralize lead toxicity but also act as a fertilizer. (C) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.