TC217 Land Reclamation

The proposed new ISSMGE-TC on Land Reclamation will focus on the following two broad issues:

a. Geotechnical issues

- To develop and update geotechnologies to overcome geotechnical challenges related to coastal development, including site investigation methods, laboratory and in-situ testing and interpretation methods corresponding to various stages from sedimentation to consolidation, evaluation of stability of geotechnical structures, prediction of long-term consolidation for large scale manmade island, large-scale dredging and its impact, development of environment-friendly recycled/reused material, land reclamation methods, ground improvement methods, field monitoring and applications of the observational method in construction and maintenance.

b. Geoenvironmental issues

-  To minimize environmental impacts due to coastal development through development of construction methods for environment-friendly seawalls, design and monitoring of artificial coastal structures including intertidal flats, reliability and durability of development of new environment-friendly material. The main aim of the TC is to promote a greater interaction among engineers engaged in geotechnical and geoenvironmental engineering related to land reclamation so as to achieve greater cooperation and facilitate the exchange of information, experience, knowledge, and new ideas in these two areas. In the next four years, the committee would endeavor to organize at least two small to medium size workshops, with at least one of them to coincide with a regional conference under the auspices of ISSMGE (e.g. the 15th Asian Regional Conference in Fukuoka, 2015 or the 19th ICSMGE in Seoul, 2017). In each workshop, the two themes listed above will be discussed. One principal aim of these workshops is to ensure publication of excellent case histories and associate construction experience, as well as technical proposals for future projects.

TC217 session during the 15th Asian Regional Conference on Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering (ISSMGE- 15ARC), 9 to 13 November 2015,Fukuoka, Japan TC217 session during the 19th Southeast Geotechnical Conference, 31 May to 3 Jun 2016, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia TC217 session during the 19th ICSMGE, 17-22 September 2017, Seoul, Korea (if accepted)

Geotechnical engineering in land reclamation has a unique role to respond to these demands in coastal development. Geotechnical engineers have to develop innovative technologies for land reclamation and coastal structures such as quays, seawalls, and revetments, in consideration of environment-friendly recycled/reused material and construction methods to achieve minimal environmental impact. Also, the engineers have to develop innovative ideas to preserve/restore rich biodiversity in coastal regions. The development and conservation technologies in land reclamation need to collaboratively work together to prevent from disorderly coastal land development.