| Date | Thursday January 26, 2012 – PRESENTATION POSTPONED! |
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| Event | January – Regular Series Lecture |
| Location | Austrian Canadian Cultural Centre |
| Time |
5:30 am – Cash Bar and Light Snacks 6:00 pm – Presentation |
| Speakers | Rodolfo Sancio, Ph.D., P.E., Geosyntec  |
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Dr. Sancio is a geotechnical engineer and lead of Geosyntec's Houston, Texas geotechnical engineering group. He has 14 years of experience in most areas of practice such as: geotechnical site investigations and soil/rock characterization, development and execution of specialized laboratory testing programs for development of parameters for sands, clays, silts, mine tailings, and fly ash, foundation engineering for large industrial facilities including recommendations for the selection of shallow or deep foundation systems, site and foundation settlement evaluations, probabilistic and deterministic seismic hazard assessments, static and dynamic slope stability analysis, construction issues related to site preparation and development, site development feasibility studies, earthquake reconnaissance missions and post-earthquake assessment of the performance of earthen structures and foundations, large scale modeling, issues related to seabed gouging by ice and the safety of offshore pipelines in cold regions, wave induced liquefaction analysis and pipeline flotation issues, and civil construction. For the past 8 years, Dr. Sancio's experience was mainly focused on onshore and offshore geotechnical engineering issues for the upstream and midstream oil and gas and petrochemical industry. His work has included sites in Saharan and Sub-Saharan Africa, the Caribbean, Gulf of Guinea, the North Caspian Sea, Sakhalin Island, Russia, Canada, and South America. Dr. Sancio has authored or coauthored over 20 journal and conference publications, including a study on the liquefaction susceptibility of fine-grained soils that became the accepted methodology included in the 2006 version of the Canadian Foundation Engineering Manual, a study of the measurement of energy transferred during the Standard Penetration Test that was used as guidance in the development of the ASTM D4633 standard, interpretation of CPT tests in engineering practice, results of cyclic testing on fine grained soils, and results of subsurface characterization using in situ tests. |
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| Topic | Assessment of Seismically and Statically Induced Liquefaction of Fine-Grained Soils |
| Abstract | The catastrophic failure of the TVA Kingston Dredge Pond in December of 2008 is said to have been caused by static liquefaction... |
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of fly ash, a fine-grained coal combustion residue that has been typically disposed in ponds using wet deposition methods. In 2010 the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency published a proposal to regulate coal combustion residuals, including fly ash. These pending regulations would end the use of wet-disposal techniques and require "rapid" closure of existing ash ponds. This has led to the need by the operators of coal combustion facilities to better understand the potential geotechnical implications of these regulations and develop techniques to assess static and seismically induced liquefaction of fly ash. The presenter will provide background on static liquefaction, seismically-induced liquefaction of fine grained soils, and discuss the susceptibility of fly ash to statically and seismically induced liquefaction. Existing methodologies for their assessment and their shortcomings will be discussed. |
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| Cost | Free |
| RSVP | Not Required |
| Date | Thursday December 15, 2011 |
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| Event | December – Regular Series Lecture |
| Location | Austrian Canadian Cultural Centre |
| Time |
5:30 am – Cash Bar and Light Snacks 6:00 pm – Presentation |
| Speakers | Martin Halliwell, P.Eng., HCM Contractors Inc. Matthew Janes, P.Eng., Isherwood Associates. |
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Martin Halliwell, P.Eng., is a graduate of the University of Western Ontario (UWO), London, ON, and President of the HCM group of companies. He has over 28 years of experience in heavy civil construction. He gained extensive background in specialty design-build geotechnical contracting while serving as Operations Manager at Deep Foundations Contractors between 1982 and 1989. The HCM Group offers innovative design-build foundation and excavation support solutions to clients in Ontario, Alberta, British Columbia, and Saskatchewan. Matthew Janes, P.Eng., is also a UWO graduate. He is a Senior Designer with Isherwood Associates, one of the leading geo-structural design firms in Canada, and has over 25 years experience in specialty geotechnical design and construction including extensive expertise in predictive geotechnical modeling. He is also President and Founder of Vancouver-based Resonance Technologies Inc., a firm offering Sonic Vibration Technology to the foundation industry throughout North America. Matt is a Trustee of the Deep Foundations Institute, and was a two-time All Canadian linebacker for the powerful UWO Mustangs. |
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| Topic | Bow Tower Project |
| Abstract | The Encana Corporation Bow Tower Project in downtown Calgary featured the largest design-build excavation support system... |
| ever constructed in Calgary. The site covered two city blocks, had a footprint of 17,000 m2 and a supported face of 13,000 m2. Challenging geotechnical conditions included water bearing gravels over soft rock which was highly susceptible to weathering. HCM Contractors teamed with Isherwood Associates on a unique solution involving a tieback-supported Secant Wall Over Shotcrete (SWOS wall) to retain the 20.5 m (70 ft) deep excavation. This two part presentation features both the Contractor (Martin Halliwell) and Designer (Matt Janes) in a unique format designed to provide the listener with a clear view of the practical challenges, the analysis and design process, and the knowledge gained. This Project was also presented at the Annual Meeting of the Deep Foundations Institute. | |
| Cost | Free |
| RSVP | Not Required |
| Date | Friday November 4, 2011 |
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| Event | Fall Cross-Canada Lecture Tour (CCLT) 2011 |
| Location | Austrian Canadian Cultural Centre |
| Time |
11:45 am – Registration and Cash Bar 12:00 pm – Buffet Lunch 12:25 pm – Presentation |
| Speaker | Steven G. Vick, P.E., author and independent consultant |
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Author and independent consultant Steven G. Vick has based his practice in the mountains of Colorado for the past 25 of his 40 years in the profession. Long specializing in mining geotechnics, his first book Planning, Design, and Analysis of Tailings Dams remains the classic text on the topic and has been in print continuously for almost 30 years. Focusing on dam safety aspects, in the 1990s Vick spearheaded the first catalog of tailings dam failures, compiled by the U.S. Society on Dams. Beginning with graduate research at MIT, his other main interest has been risk and probabilistic methods. In a crossover application, Vick helped pioneer risk analysis in dam safety with the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and other dam owners in Canada and elsewhere. This led to publication in 2002 of Degrees of Belief, the only book of its kind exploring the interface between subjective probability and engineering judgment. Drawing on fields beyond engineering, it has been called a “masterpiece of Natural Philosophy.” A veteran of Klohn Leonoff's former Denver office, Vick has always had close ties with the Canadian geotechnical community. For him, this enhances the honour of presenting the fall 2011 Cross Canada Lecture Tour. |
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| Topic | The Science of Judgment |
| Abstract | Since Ralph Peck asked in 1980 where judgment had gone, there has been little sign of its return, and engineering judgment... |
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is privately viewed in some circles as a metaphysics for the elderly or the analytically inept. This lecture seeks to revive the concept of engineering judgment by elaborating its principles and establishing its foundations in cognitive and behavioural research. First, judgment is fundamentally inductive – using specific cases to arrive at generalizations, a property it shares with all branches of science, with only mathematics being wholly deductive. This may seem to put judgment at odds with the mathematically deductive character of engineering analysis that reasons the other way around – from the general to the specific, from first principles to what passes for objective truth. But in all engineering problem solving, it is the judgmental induction of diagnosis that precedes deductive analysis, and inductive judgment of interpretation that follows. Inductive judgment and deductive analysis are complementary. Neither is right or wrong; they do different things. In deductive analysis, if all of the premises (assumptions) are true, then the conclusion (results) must be true. Induction cannot arrive at unequivocal truth, it can only find something to be probably true. Inseparable from judgment then is the notion of probability, and the relation between the two has much to say about judgment's cognitive basis. Within this framework, the lecture develops the following topics in a geotechnical context: • Causal and statistical reasoning strategies • The relationship between experience and judgment • The role of case histories • Weighing evidence: the importance of lists • Calibration and feedback • Mental simulation and Homer Simpson • Risk analysis in diagnosis and visualization • Geology in diagnosis and visualization • Pattern recognition, experience, and case histories • Intuition, hypothesis, diagnosis, and pattern recognition: Henri Poincare • Situational awareness: seeing the Big Picture For many, this framework will provide a new perspective on judgment. It does not merely assert, it establishes why judgment is a necessary component of all engineering problem solving, far from the nebulous accessory it has often been taken to be. |
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| Cost |
$40 per person; full-time students are free of charge. Pay at the door by cash or cheque only; pre-registration is required. |
| RSVP |
By email to CCLT@cgygeosociety.org or phone at 403-216-8992 by Tuesday November 1, 2011. Please include your company name, phone number and indicate any dietary restrictions. |
| Date | Thursday September 22, 2011 |
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| Event | September – Regular Series Lecture |
| Location | Austrian Canadian Cultural Centre |
| Time |
5:30 pm – Cash Bar 6:00 pm – Lecture |
| Speaker | Sidantha Weerakone, Ph.D., Golder Associates Ltd. Winner of the Calgary Geotechnical Society's 2011 Student Travel Award |
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Sidantha obtained his PhD degree from the University of Calgary under the supervision of Dr. Ron Wong and his Masters and Bachelors degrees from Singapore and Sri Lanka, respectively. His postgraduate research background covers Hydrology, Hydrogeology and Geotechnical Engineering. Sidantha authored and co-authored several journal and conference papers. Sidantha is a junior geotechnical engineer in Golder Associates Ltd. Before joining Golder, he worked as a junior engineer in E2K Engineering, Canada and Toa Corporation, Singapore. At Golder, Sidantha is mainly involved in geotechnical design work of tailing ponds and other related infrastructure for oil sand mines, specifically in stability, deformation and seepage aspects. He also conducts sequential tailing deposition simulations for tailings management purposes. Sidantha was a member of the organizing committee for the 2010 Canadian Young Geotechnical Engineers and Geologists conference (cYGEGC 2010). He also worked as student representative and executive committee member of the Calgary Geotechnical Society for two consecutive years. Sidantha has received NSERC doctoral scholarship, Queen Elizabeth II doctoral scholarship, Dean's entrance scholarship and Government of Alberta graduate student scholarship as a post graduate student at U of C. The Calgary Geotechnical Society has recently selected to sponsor him to attend the 2011 Pan-Am CGS Geotechnical Conference. |
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| Topic | Effect of Fracture Characteristics on Dense Non-Aqueous Phase Liquids (DNAPL)-Water Flow in Rock Fractures |
| Abstract | This study investigated the immiscible two-phase flow processes in rock fractures, experimentally and theoretically, under... |
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capillary forces dominated and viscous forces dominated conditions. The aperture distributions required for the study were obtained from fractures in sandstone and shale specimens of Alberta Paskapoo Formation using X-ray Computed Tomography (CT) technique. Capillary pressure-saturation relationship was the most important parameter to be determined from the laboratory experiments to solve the governing equations of capillary forces dominated two-phase flow in rock fractures. Experiments were designed and conducted to measure the capillary pressure saturation relationship for rock fractures. A reasonable comparison was observed between the experimentally and theoretically determined capillary pressure curves. Further, the geostatistically generated aperture distributions demonstrated that the amount of spatial continuity in aperture distributions in flow direction affects the properties of the capillary pressure-saturation relationship and single phase permeability of rock fractures. The experimental results of two-phase flow tests indicated that the conventional relative permeability concept cannot represent the viscous forces dominated two-phase flow in fractures accurately. Instead, the Lockhart-Martinelli model that is used to analyze two-phase flow in pipes demonstrated a better match. |
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| Cost | Free |
| RSVP | Not Required |