Environmental Geotechnology : Meeting Challenges Through Needs-based Instrumentation / D.N. Singh, Afshin Asadi & Goli Venkata Siva Naga Sai

The rise of rapid and uncontrolled industrialization, its alarming levels of hazardous waste produced, and their negative contribution to the international environmental epidemic of global warming — in addition to the decrease in room to dispose of these wastes safely — have put the pressure for many engineers, researchers, and key decision-makers to find the answers to the constant tussle between progress and sustainability — and quickly.

Environmental Geotechnology revisits existing concepts of geotechnical engineering critically, and brings them up to date with new knowledge and current affairs so as to better address and serve today's needs of the professionals. It points out the role and importance of the parameters and mechanisms that govern the interaction of contaminants with geomaterials (soil and rock mass), and also discusses their degradation in the long-run, and the consequences that follow.

The book starts from a engineering philosophy that incorporates the influence of environmental effects (both manmade and natural) on geotechnical engineering practices. Its contents are based on geotechnical and environmental engineering studies pertaining to waste management, such as: the safe handling, transportation and disposal of waste, the estimation of waste leakage into the subsurface, its consequences, methods of containment, and the development of schemes to remediate contaminated land. It also proposes innovative strategies for waste management through the utilization of wastes based on a comprehensive characterization.

Modelling techniques such as accelerated physical modelling using geotechnical centrifuge, finite-element or difference-based numerical modelling and physico-chemico-mineralogical modelling are discussed in this book to enable the study of the complex (and otherwise slow) process of contaminant-geomaterial interaction.

Authors

Prof. D N Singh (DNS) is associated with the Civil Engineering Department at Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, India. He has obtained Bachelor's, Masters and Doctoral degrees from Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur, India, in 1986, 1989 and 1993, respectively. His teaching, and R&D activities are in quite diversified areas of geotechnical and geoenvironmental engineering. Apart from teaching and research, Prof. Singh has been very actively associated with some of the most prestigious business houses as an in-house instructor and retainer consultant. He has established a state-of-the-art Laboratory for Geoenvironmental Research and Innovation in collaboration with Confederation of Indian Industries, New Delhi. Prof. Singh is Fellow of the Indian National Academy of Engineering (INAE), New Delhi; American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE); and Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE), London, UK. He also founded Environmental Geotechnics, published by ICE Publishing, London, UK, and has been its Editor-in-Chief since its inception. He has also been Editorial Board Member of several journals of repute. Prof Singh is the recipient of the 2003 SP Research Award by SP Foundation, Rolla, MO, USA, and was the Chairman of the 12th International Association for Computer Methods and Advances in Geomechanics (IACMAG) Conference, held in Goa, India. He is the recipient of the Excellent Contributions Award (2008), given by IACMAG to individuals who have a record of significant contributions in research, academic activities and professional service in different regions of the globe; the John R. Booker Excellence Award (2011), given by IACMAG for the advancement of research, education and practice of Environmental Geotechnology and development of novel techniques to simulate contaminant transport in geomaterials, under laboratory and in-situ conditions; the Richard Feynman Prize (2014), for the best paper published by ICE journals; and the Canadian Geotechnical Journal Fredlund Award (2019), for the paper with the highest number of citations among all those published by the journal in previous five years.

Dr Afshin Asadi is a Senior Academic and Program Leader of Civil Engineering Discipline at the International College of Auckland and the Director of the EnvoGéotechnique Ltd, Auckland, New Zealand. He completed a BSc degree in Civil Engineering, an MSc Degree in Environmental Engineering, and a PhD in Geotechnical Engineering. Prior to his current appointment, he was a Senior Research Fellow for Universiti Putra Malaysia, an Endeavour Research Fellow for the Department of Civil, Mining & Environmental Engineering for the University of Wollongong, Australia, and a Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Invited Fellow for the Department of Sustainable Resources Engineering and Geoenvironmental Engineering at Hokkaido University, Japan. Dr Asadi is a Chartered Member of Engineering New Zealand (CMEngNZ) and a Chartered Professional Engineer(CPEng). He has taught, researched, consulted and published on a wide range of geotechnical topics that adopt an environmental approach. He is the co-author of Geotechnics of Organic Soils and Peat and published a rich amount of peer-reviewed articles in the area of environmental-friendly soil improvement techniques. He has served on the editorial panel of the Environmental Geotechnics published by the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) publishing, and the International Journal of Geosynthetics and Ground Engineering.

Mr Goli Venkata Siva Naga Sai (Goli) obtained his Civil Engineering undergraduate degree from Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University, Kakinada, India in 2016. He worked on projects titled 'A Study on Ground Water Quality in AP-CRDA Region' and 'Influence of fly ash and rice husk ash on compressive strength of concrete' during his undergraduate studies. He has pursued postgraduate studies in Environmental Engineering from National Institute of Technology Warangal in 2018. As a part of his postgraduate dissertation, he worked on a 'Study of Fe2O3 as an oxygen carrier in Chemical Looping Combustion (CLC) of rice husk for CO2 capture' to address issues related to waste management and disposal. Currently, at Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, he is pursuing doctoral studies in the field of waste management. His research interests include landfill mining, valorization of landfill mined residues and industrial by-products for sustainable development, and polymer waste composites. He has published 10 international peer-reviewed articles. He is a student member of professional bodies such as the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) and International Geosynthetics Society (IGS).

Preface

Contents

Chapter 1: Introduction

Chapter 2: The Nature of the Environment and Soil

Chapter 3: Conventional- and Neo-Geomaterials

Chapter 4: Geomaterial Characterization

Chapter 5: Geoenvironmental Centrifuge Modelling

Chapter 6: Contaminant Transport in Saturated Soils

Chapter 7: Contaminant Transport in Unsaturated Soils

Chapter 8: Contaminant Transport in Intact Rock Mass

Chapter 9: Heat Migration in Geomaterials

Chapter 10: Response of Geomaterials to Electromagnetic Field

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