GEOLOGICAL AND GEOTECHNICAL ENGINEERING IN THE NEW MILLENNIUM
OPPORTUNITIES FOR RESEARCH AND TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION
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NOTICE: The project that is the subject of this report was approved by the Governing Board of the National Research Council, whose members are drawn from the councils of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, and the Institute of Medicine. The members of the committee responsible for the report were chosen for their special competences and with regard for appropriate balance.
This study was supported by Grant No. CMS-0229020 between the National Academy of Sciences and the National Science Foundation. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the organizations or agencies that provided support for the project.
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THE NATIONAL ACADEMIES
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COMMITTEE ON GEOLOGICAL AND GEOTECHNICAL ENGINEERING IN THE NEW MILLENNIUM: OPPORTUNITIES FOR RESEARCH AND TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION
Members
JANE C. S. LONG, Chair,
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore, California
BERNARD AMADEI,
University of Colorado, Boulder
JEAN-PIERRE BARDET,
University of Southern California, Los Angeles
JOHN T. CHRISTIAN,
Waban, Massachusetts
STEVEN D. GLASER,
University of California, Berkeley
DEBORAH J. GOODINGS,
University of Maryland, College Park
EDWARD KAVAZANJIAN JR.,
Arizona State University, Tempe
DAVID W. MAJOR,
GeoSyntec Consultants Inc., Ontario, Canada
JAMES K. MITCHELL,
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg
MARY M. POULTON,
The University of Arizona, Tucson
J. CARLOS SANTAMARINA,
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta
Staff
ANTHONY R. DE SOUZA, Director
JENNIFER T. ESTEP, Financial Associate
CAETLIN M. OFIESH, Research Assistant
RADHIKA CHARI, Senior Project Assistant (until March 2004)
AMANDA M. ROBERTS, Program Assistant (from July 2004)
COMMITTEE ON GEOLOGICAL AND GEOTECHNICAL ENGINEERING
Members
NICHOLAS SITAR, Chair,
University of California, Berkeley
SUSAN E. BURNS,
University of Virginia, Charlottesville
JOHN T. CHRISTIAN,
Waban, Massachusetts
KIM DE RUBERTIS,
Cashmere, Washington
THOMAS W. DOE,
Golder Associates, Redmond, Washington
JOANNE T. FREDRICH,
Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, New Mexico
LARRY W. LAKE,
The University of Texas, Austin
RAY E. MARTIN,
Ray E. Martin, LLC, Ashland, Virginia
MARY M. POULTON,
The University of Arizona, Tucson
DONALD W. STEEPLES,
University of Kansas, Lawrence
Staff
SAMMANTHA L. MAGSINO, Program Officer
AMANDA M. ROBERTS, Program Assistant
BOARD ON EARTH SCIENCES AND RESOURCES
Members
GEORGE M. HORNBERGER, Chair,
University of Virginia, Charlottesville
M. LEE ALLISON,
Office of the Governor, Topeka, Kansas
STEVEN R. BOHLEN,
Joint Oceanographic Institutions, Washington, D.C.
ADAM M. DZIEWONSKI,
Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts
KATHERINE H. FREEMAN,
The Pennsylvania State University, University Park
RHEA L. GRAHAM,
New Mexico Interstate Stream Commission, Albuquerque
ROBYN HANNIGAN,
Arkansas State University, State University
V. RAMA MURTHY,
University of Minnesota, Minneapolis
RAYMOND A. PRICE,
Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario
MARK SCHAEFER,
NatureServe, Arlington, Virginia
BILLIE L. TURNER II,
Clark University, Worcester, Massachusetts
STEPHEN G. WELLS,
Desert Research Institute, Reno, Nevada
THOMAS J. WILBANKS,
Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, Tennessee
Staff
ANTHONY R. DE SOUZA, Director
ELIZABETH A. EIDE, Senior Program Officer
DAVID A. FEARY, Senior Program Officer
ANNE M. LINN, Senior Program Officer
ANN G. FRAZIER, Program Officer
SAMMANTHA L. MAGSINO, Program Officer
RONALD F. ABLER, Senior Scholar
HEDY J. ROSSMEISSL, Senior Scholar
VERNA J. BOWEN, Administrative and Financial Associate
JENNIFER T. ESTEP, Financial Associate
TANJA E. PILZAK, Research Associate
CAETLIN M. OFIESH, Research Assistant
JAMES B. DAVIS, Program Assistant
JARED P. ENO, Program Assistant
AMANDA M. ROBERTS, Program Assistant
Acknowledgment of Reviewers
This report has been reviewed in draft form by individuals chosen for their diverse perspectives and technical expertise, in accordance with procedures approved by the National Research Council’s (NRC) Report Review Committee. The purpose of this independent review is to provide candid and critical comments that will assist the institution in making its published report as sound as possible and to ensure that the report meets institutional standards for objectivity, evidence, and responsiveness to the study charge. The review comments and draft manuscript remain confidential to protect the integrity of the deliberative process. We wish to thank the following individuals for their review of this report:
Braden Allenby, Arizona State University, Tempe
Chris Breeds, Sub Terra, North Bend, Washington
Corale Brierley, Brierley Consultancy LLC, Highlands Ranch, Colorado
John Dunicliff, Geotechnical Instrumentation Consultant, Devon, England
Henry Hatch, Former Chief of Engineers, U.S. Army, Oakton, Virginia
Elvin R. Heiberg, III, Heiberg Associates, Arlington, Virginia
Norbert Morgenstern, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada
Although the reviewers listed above have provided many constructive comments and suggestions, they were not asked to endorse the conclusions or recommendations, nor did they see the final draft of the report before its release. The review of this report was overseen by William Fisher, The University of Texas at Austin. Appointed by the NRC, he was responsible for making certain that an independent examination of the report was carried out in accordance with institutional procedures and that all review comments were carefully considered. Responsibility for the final content of this report rests entirely with the authoring committee and the institution.
Preface
The charge to this committee—to envision the future of geotechnology—is at once a grand challenge and a problem. In many ways, geotechnology is a mature field having come to its majority in the last 50 years. Many serious problems have been solved. We know how to build strong foundations, safe dams, and stable roads and tunnels. We have a good understanding about the behavior and protection of groundwater, how to extract the petroleum resources, and develop a geothermal field. We understand quite a bit about the soil conditions that lead to liquefaction during an earthquake or make landslides likely. If there is a major problem, it is that the state of the practice worldwide does not match the state of the art. Even when the knowledge exists, economics or ignorance lead to harmful, suboptimal, and dangerous practice. People still build trailer parks on flood plains.
Those of us who have been trained to this state of the art are trained to keep digging deeper (in the intellectual sense) and to refine and improve our understanding and methods. We are more tuned to what we still do not know and cannot yet do versus reflecting on how far we have come and how much we are now capable of compared to the past. Given the approaches and lexicons we are used to, we have a kind of Zeno’s paradox in moving forward. Each step forward is smaller than the last in comparison to the totality of progress
in the field. Quantum leaps are farther and fewer using the same paradigms, technology, and approaches.
The problems have also changed. We can no longer expect to do an engineering project that has no reference to the impacts of the design on social structures, economics, and the environment. Sustainability has become an imperative recognized by the engineering profession (see, for example, the World Federation of Engineering Organizations website, http://www.unesco.org/wfeo/) in general and the professional societies involving geoengineering (e.g., the American Society Civil Engineers, Society of Manufacturing Engineers, Society of Petroleum Engineers). Earth-type problems are now recognized on regional and global scales. Engineers need to embrace social science aspects of their problems if they are to develop acceptable designs.
Geoengineering as a discipline and practice can and should change. Geoengineers should look to entirely new technologies and approaches to solve problems faster, better, cheaper. The problems geoengineers solve are important to society, and the current technological constraints are in many cases less likely to be solved by beating them with old approaches than they are to be cracked by new technological and more interdisciplinary approaches. Geoengineers, with their focus on Earth are poised to expand their roles and lead in the solution of modern Earth systems problems, such as global change, emission free energy supply, global water supply, and urban systems.
Changing established fields of engineering is not easy. It is a truism that practitioners and researchers are most comfortable in the realm of their known approaches and problem spaces. It is perhaps more important to realize that geoengineers know that the problems they have been solving still need to be solved and the techniques and technology they currently use are still a propos. Part of moving ahead involves being able to feel the confidence that the significant progress made to date will not be lost through a love affair with the new and exciting. At the same time that this report promotes and encourages change, the committee also felt the stress of this change. As much as we found enthusiasm and genuine
excitement about the possibilities of the future, we were not immune to concerns about the future of support for, and education in, traditional geoengineering.
As chair, it is my hope that the readers of this report will be captured by the imaginative and creative possibilities of embracing whole new technological approaches to research and the migration to problems that have become dominant issues for our world today. If we do not find better ways to solve our traditional problems, economic and environmental concerns will push these solutions further and further out of reach. For example, we certainly know how to build underground infrastructure in cities, but we had to spend over $14.6 billion to construct Boston’s Central Artery and the disruption to the city was lengthy and extensive. Many such projects will be required in our cities but will we have the ability to do them if we cannot significantly decrease the cost, reliability and time of construction, not to mention our ability to manage them? The ability to build such structures as safe dams, extensive highways, and safe water supply systems was an imperative of the last century. Perhaps the most important imperative of this century is sustainability and the most salient feature of sustainability is the scale of the problem. Geoengineering is a great starting point for addressing many Earth system issues, and I see tremendous importance in this endeavor. It has been the committee’s privilege to learn, think, and write about this. We hope you become as interested in the possibilities as we are.
Finally, I would like to thank the committee members who worked so hard to complete this report.
Jane C. S. Long
Chair