Climate Change and Geotechnical Engineering

A special issue of Geosciences (ISSN 2076-3263).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 June 2023) | Viewed by 10122

Special Issue Editors


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Guest Editor
Regional Models and Geo-Hydrological Impacts (REMHI) Division, CMCC Foundation Euro-Mediterranean Center on Climate Change, 73100 Lecce, Italy
Interests: slope stability; hydrological modeling; water balance; evapotranspiration modeling; hydro-thermal modeling; landslides; evaporation; unsaturated soil
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Guest Editor
Regional Models and Geo-Hydrological Impacts (REMHI) Division, CMCC Foundation Euro-Mediterranean Center on Climate Change, 73100 Lecce, Italy
Interests: weather-induced landslides; climate change adaptation; nature based solutions; physically-based approaches

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Guest Editor
Institute for Geotechnics, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Sciences, Technische Universität Darmstadt, 64289 Darmstadt, Germany
Interests: liquefaction; slope stability; unsaturated soil mechanics; climate change and geo-engineering; loess geohazards; expansive clays

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

During the 56th Rankine Lecture “Geotechnics, energy and climate change” by Prof. Jardine, it was stated how geotechnical engineering has matured sufficiently to contribute to resolving some of society’s grand challenges. Climate change represents one of these substantial challenges, recognized worldwide, that is having the greatest impact on our way of life and well-being.

In this view, geotechnical engineering can play a key role in terms of the adaptation of earth structures and slopes to climate changes. Specifically, there is an increasing need to quantify the impacts of more severe and frequent extreme events on the short- and long-term behaviour of earth structures and response of natural/engineered slopes. However, despite there being several large-scale studies devoted to investigating various aspects of climate change, a clear gap in the state of knowledge still exists with reference to the analysis of the resilience of geotechnical structures, and natural and engineered slopes to changes in climatic trends. Many of these climatic trends pose multi-physics problems, involving thermo-hydro-mechanical processes in soils and earth structures.

To support predictions and projections, last-generation datasets with high spatio-temporal resolution—like those from the Copernicus Services’ Portals—are useful to feed models, big data analytics enabling timely, robust, and efficient decisions.

This Special Issue enables researchers to broadly contribute to these topics by exploring how soil–atmosphere interactions and extreme event patterns in a changing climate can affect the performance of geotechnical structures and natural/engineered slopes, with a key perspective on the role of geotechnical engineering in climate adaptation.

It is recommended that authors approach, at an early stage, the Guest Editors about possible submissions to verify the appropriateness of their potential contributions. If appropriate, an abstract will be requested, and the corresponding author will be required to submit their full manuscript online by the deadline of 15 October 2021.

Dr. Alfredo Reder
Dr. Guido Rianna
Dr. Mary Antonette Beroya-Eitner
Guest Editors

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Keywords

  • Climate change
  • Geotechnical engineering
  • Earth structure
  • Natural and engineered slopes
  • Extreme events

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Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

22 pages, 4243 KiB  
Article
Experimental Analysis of the Fire-Induced Effects on the Physical, Mechanical, and Hydraulic Properties of Sloping Pyroclastic Soils
by Dario Peduto, Luca Iervolino and Vito Foresta
Geosciences 2022, 12(5), 198; https://doi.org/10.3390/geosciences12050198 - 6 May 2022
Cited by 9 | Viewed by 2863
Abstract
The paper investigates the changes in the physical, mechanical, and hydraulic properties of coarse-grained pyroclastic soils, considered under both wildfire-burned and laboratory heating conditions. The soil samples were collected on Mount “Le Porche” in the municipality of Siano (Campania Region, Southern Italy), hit [...] Read more.
The paper investigates the changes in the physical, mechanical, and hydraulic properties of coarse-grained pyroclastic soils, considered under both wildfire-burned and laboratory heating conditions. The soil samples were collected on Mount “Le Porche” in the municipality of Siano (Campania Region, Southern Italy), hit by wildfires on 20 September 2019. The area is prone to fast-moving landslides, as testified by the disastrous events of 5–6 May 1998. The experimental results show that the analyzed surficial samples exhibited (i) grain size distribution variations due to the disaggregation of gravelly and sandy particles (mostly of pumice nature), (ii) chromatic changes ranging from black to reddish, (iii) changes in specific gravity in low-severity fire-burned soil samples different from those exposed to laboratory heating treatments; (iv) progressive reductions of shear strength, associated with a decrease in the cohesive contribution offered by the soil-root systems and, for more severe burns, even in the soil friction angle, and (v) changes in soil-water retention capacity. Although the analyses deserve further deepening, the appropriate knowledge on these issues could provide key inputs for geotechnical analyses dealing with landslide susceptibility on fire-affected slopes in unsaturated conditions. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Climate Change and Geotechnical Engineering)
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24 pages, 3759 KiB  
Article
Climate Change Adaptation of Geo-Structures in Europe: Emerging Issues and Future Steps
by Alessandra Insana, Mary Antonette Beroya-Eitner, Marco Barla, Hauke Zachert, Bojan Žlender, Margreet van Marle, Bjørn Kalsnes, Tamara Bračko, Carlos Pereira, Iulia Prodan, Fabien Szymkiewicz and Hjördis Löfroth
Geosciences 2021, 11(12), 488; https://doi.org/10.3390/geosciences11120488 - 29 Nov 2021
Cited by 10 | Viewed by 4635
Abstract
Climate change is already being felt in Europe, unequivocally affecting the regions’ geo-structures. Concern over this is rising, as reflected in the increasing number of studies on the subject. However, the majority of these studies focused only on slopes and on a limited [...] Read more.
Climate change is already being felt in Europe, unequivocally affecting the regions’ geo-structures. Concern over this is rising, as reflected in the increasing number of studies on the subject. However, the majority of these studies focused only on slopes and on a limited geographical scope. In this paper, we attempted to provide a broader picture of potential climate change impacts on the geo-structures in Europe by gathering the collective view of geo-engineers and geo-scientists in several countries, and by considering different geo-structure types. We also investigated how geo-structural concerns are being addressed in national adaptation plans. We found that specific provisions for geo-structural adaptation are generally lacking and mainly come in the form of strategies for specific problems. In this regard, two common strategies are hazard/risk assessment and monitoring, which are mainly implemented in relation to slope stability. We recommend that in future steps, other geo-structures are likewise given attention, particularly those assessed as also potentially significantly affected by climate change. Countries considered in this study are mainly the member countries of the European Large Geotechnical Institutes Platform (ELGIP). Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Climate Change and Geotechnical Engineering)
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