COGAN update and upcoming webinar

It is finally online for download the final report on the Industry Needs Survey, aimed at identifying the perceived need of an organized system of educational resources from engineers employed in Industry. The full report can be downloaded here. Summarizing its main outcome, the 619 participants pointed out the difficulties encountered when dealing with numerical analysis for Geotechnical Design. Chiefly amongst them, the difficulties of a proper validation of analysis results, obtaining soil/rock parameters, lack of resources allocated for training and the poor access to in-house experts or the total absence of a mentoring system.

Furthermore, it was indicated that the main topics that practicioners would like to be covered by COGAN deliverables range from basic knowledge such as the underpinning soil and rock mechanics, constitutive modelling and fundamentals of numerical analysis, as well as shallow and deep foundations, natural slopes and earthworks and deep excavations. A special module will be devoted to the use of numerical analyis and design code considerations. The modules will be edited by international experts, such as Antonio Gens, David Muir Wood, Helmut Schweiger, Minna Karstunen and Brian Simpson, amongst many others.

On the topic of the inconsistent implementation of powerful software tools in geotechnical industry, Brian Simpson will be delivering a free webinar on computing for Geotechnical Design on the 24th October 2014 (12:00 Noon BST, 13:00 CEST, 08:00 EDT, 05:00 PDT). Those who are interested can find more information and register here.

More information on COGAN on the project website.