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Proceedings of the 18
th
International Conference on Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering, Paris 2013
Very common in most of the European countries is the
arrangement of Special Lecture, which is mostly presented by
very well known foreign expert. Again also few of the
“Special Lectures” are mentioned:
- London, UK - Rankin Lecture;
- Vienna, Austria – Terzaghi (Vienna) Lecture;
- Prague, Czech Republic – Prague Geotechnical Lecture;
- Budapest, Hungary – Széchy Memorial Lecture
- Ljubljana, Slovenia – Šuklje Memorial Lecture
In some cases when national “Geotechnical Society” is
covering all activities of geo-engineering this society is also
responsible for activities falling under the umbrella of so called
“sister” international societies – as ISRM, IAEG, or ITA, IGS,
EFEC e.g. ITA/AITES Congress Finland Helsinki, 2011 or
EuroGeo – geosynthetics, Valencia, Spain, 2012.
9
COMMON SENSITIVE PROBLEMS IN EUROPE
During discussion with professional colleagues I have feeling,
that the following 3 items are most sensitive in Europe right
now:
- Geotechnical Engineering Education – after Bologna
Agreement
- Geotechnical Design – according to Eurocode 7 –
Geotechnical Design
- Risk associated in Geotechnical Engineering Profession
and Professional Prestige.
As the first two points will be discussed during ERTC
Workshops in Athens I will mention only few words to the last
point.
Risk associated with design and construction of
geotechnical structures is connected either with exactness with
which we are able to define
- Geological model of environment which is in
interaction with proposed structure – and is describing
individual layers together with their boundaries.
- Geotechnical model –which is specifying geotechnical
data to the individual layers or boundaries (different
discontinuities)
- Numerical model – describing the behaviour of
geological environment when influenced by proposed
structures. Note that for very complicated cases, e.g.
for potential design of nuclear high level waste
repository, model should not only describe mechanical
behaviour but also behaviour with respect to
temperature changes, contaminant (radionuclide)
spreading etc.
We all know that our ability to precisely describe
mechanical, thermal, chemical or hydraulic changes is limited
as we are usually able to examine only limited part of
geological environment, let say one millionth. Therefore as
uncertainties connected with steel structures for simple cases
can be in the range of 3-5 %, for concrete structures 5-10%, for
timber structures 10-20%, after that for earth structures it can be
up to 50%. In addition quality of earth structures during
construction is usually not controlled by parameters which are
later on used during design, but indirectly with the help of
moisture content and dry density.
Also our today approach to the design, limit state approach,
is based on fact that our structures are designed with a certain
risk of failures. However the society demands only solutions
which are able to guarantee 100 % safety. We know that this
condition cannot be fulfilled therefore we (consultants and
contractors – geotechnical engineers generally) have to try to
find partner (client, investor, government) which should share
this risk with us.
Regarding professional prestige we can always stress our
special position either between civil engineers or on level of
society in general.
For the civil engineering level it is fact that Eurocode 7
unambiguously declares that in comparison with other
Eurocodes, EC 7 is not only material code, but also the code for
interaction (with practically all other structures), as well as code
for loading (loading of soil or rock on other structures).
For the society in general we can stress the fact that our
profession is able to react to the society demands, e.g. with
respect to:
- Energy – utilization of geothermal energy, energy piles
etc.
- Raw materials – via utilization of different waste
materials in geotechnical structures
- Greenfields – as our profession is playing significant role
in the process of construction on brownfields
- Environmental protection => Environmental Geotechnics
- Natural hazards
During last period the first signals of improvements occur
but always the effort of our profession is behind, e.g. TC 304
Risk assessment/management. “Recently, in the Netherlands,
the Geo-Impuls joint industry development program has been
launched, in which some 30 large clients, contractors,
engineering consultants, universities and institutes do
participate. The target of the Geo-Impuls program is halving
geotechnical failures by 2015. Realizing the Geo-Impuls
objective will save the Dutch community at least several
hundreds of millions euros per year. A core activity of the Geo-
Impuls program is developing and applying sound geotechnical
risk management procedures within construction projects. New
knowledge is developed and particularly existing knowledge
will be better used, in risk-driven way. This requires a thorough
integration of geotechnical risk management with project risk
management”.
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