L A B O R AT O R Y O F S O I L M E C H A N I C S C H A I R « G A Z N AT U R E L » P E T R O S V I B R I

B I - A N N U A L R E P O R T 2 0 1 2 - 2 0 1 3

lms.epfl.ch

PROF. LYESSE LALOUI

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2012 and 2013 have been important years for the growth of the Laboratory of Soil Mechanics - Chair «Gaz Naturel» Petrosvibri (LMS). This document highlights our activities in research, teaching and services during this period.

The LMS was established in 1935 and since then it has been contributing to fundamental and applied research activities, education, as well as consult-ing for civil engineering construction works. Being the director of the LMS since 2008, I have seen the laboratory developing an internationally recog-nized expertise and claiming an important key role in the fields of nuclear waste storage, geothermal resources and unconventional energy sources. In 2012 our activities were extended to the field of geoengineering of CO2 storage in the context of the Chair “Gaz Naturel” Petrosvibri.

The Chair «Gaz Naturel» Petrosvibri provides re-sources to conduct top-notch research in the area of CO2 sequestration. More precisely, our current activities include the experimental investigation of the behaviour of host and cap rock in contact with CO2 in order to better understand different coupled

thermo-hydro-chemo-mechanical mechanisms developing there. Research is also focused on the formulation of analytical and numerical models for the prediction and the design of sequestration sites.

The LMS is currently facing a growing number of PhD students and post-docs. Our services have a research component and they are essential to sup-port very specific developments. As an example, an important contract has been signed with Chevron in 2013, a leading multinational corporation in the oil and gas industry.

I warmly thank our partners for their support dur-ing these years. Present report gives us the chance to highlight our activities for the last two years. I hope you will enjoy discovering it.

With my best regards,

Prof. Lyesse LaLoui

Director of the Laboratory of Soil Mechanics - Chair «Gaz Na-turel» Petrosvibri

PreambLe

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The LaboraTory

mission sTaTemenT

The Laboratory of Soil Mechanics (LMS) is a part of the School of Architecture, Civil and Environmental Engineering (ENAC) at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Lausanne (EPFL). Since its establish-ment - as the successor of the Geotechnical Labora-tory founded in 1935 - the LMS has been contribut-ing to fundamental and applied research activities, education, as well as consulting for civil engineer-ing construction works.

The LMS focuses its activities in three major fields:

1. Education

Lectures given by our group at BSc and MSc levels include Soil Mechanics, Groundwater Flows, Foun-dations and Geotechnical Engineering, Safety and Reliability Analysis, Construction and Environmen-tal Geology, Geomechanics and others. Specific courses concerning, among others, Mechanics of Porous Media and Experimental Geomechanics are also offered within the doctoral program in Me-chanics.

2. Research & Development

Research activities within the LMS deal, on one hand, with theoritical and applied aspects in ge-omechanics and, on the other hand, with the de-velopment of tools and computational methods for the analysis and the design of geostructures and the investigation of natural phenomena, aiming at the practical application of the obtained results.

3. Consulting Services

Consulting services offered by the LMS deal with the preparation and update of national and inter-national standards and codes, laboratory and in-situ geomechanical tests, monitoring of structures and construction sites, numerical modelling and expert evaluations.

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The LaboraTory

Lms’ sTrenghTs

Highly qualified staff of the Laboratory of Soil Me-chanics utilizes an advanced testing equipment and state-of-the-art numerical modelling tools to carry out research in the following areas:

• Natural hazards and landslides

• Deep and shallow geothermal resources

• CO2 sequestration

• Nuclear waste storage

• Unconventional energy resources

The LMS contributes to and benefits from being widely presented in national and international re-search programs.

recenT books PubLished by The Lms grouP

Lyesse Laloui and Alessio Ferrari, Multiphysical Testing of Soils and Shales. Springer (2012) ISBN 978-3-642-32492-5

Lyesse Laloui and Alice Di Donna, Energy geos-tructures: innovation in ground engineering. John Wiley & Sons, ISTE (2013) ISBN: 978-1-84821-572-6

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The Lms TechnoLogy under The swiss Tech convenTion cenTer

The LMS conducts research on the environmental methods of cooling and heating buildings through energy geostructures. These structures absorb and transport ground thermal energy to the buil-dings through fluid pipes cast in the foundations. This avoids the energy-intensive and CO2-emitting aspects of classical heating systems and air-condi-tioning. The interest is particularly focused on heat-exchanger piles. This research is supported by EOS Holding, the EPFL and the Swiss Federal Office of Energy.

The Energy Piles Experiment under the Swiss Tech Convention Center (STCC) at the EPFL is a full-scale experiment dedicated to the study of group effects within a series of heat exchanger piles. The site is lo-cated below the northern water retention tank de-signed to collect rainfalls from the STCC roof. Four piles among the twenty supporting the tank were thermally activated and instrumented. The piles are thermally loaded using the in-situ thermal response testing devices developed by our team.

A service room of 3 by 4 m2 was intergrated into the water retention tank, just above the heat exchanger piles. All the sensors deployed, as well as the absorber pipes, are gathered in the service room. The four piles, with a diameter of 900 mm, were instrumented in order to observe their behaviour under thermal and mechani-cal loads. Strain gauges and optical fibres were deployed along the piles, while a load cell was placed at the base of each one. The thermoac-tive part is located on the last 24 m of a pile, with the rest being thermally insulated. This procedure allows to get rid of the daily tem-perature variations, which seep into the soil to about 4 m under the surface, as well as the ther-mal interactions with the water retention tank.

For more information on this project you can contact:Thomas Mimouni, PhD candidatethomas.mimouni@epfl.ch

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Instalation of the heat exchanger piles at the STCC.

Top view of the four piles. View of the piles, the hydraulic circuit and diferrent soil layers.

the Swiss Tech Convention Center

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a view of The Lms infrasTrucTure

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3. 4.

5. 6.

images 1, 2, 3 : view of our advanced THM triaxial apparatus; images 4, 5 : general views of the laboratory; image 6: psychrometer and glass container (for suction control tests).

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The Laboratory of Soil Mechanics is involved in the investigation of the behaviour of shales under a variety of coupled thermo-hydro-chemo-mechanical conditions.

Shales are fine grained sedimentary geomaterials usually characterized by having low porosity, do-minant pore size in the range of nanometres and matrix permeability as low as few nanodarcy. They embody a number of properties, which make them suitable for several engineering purposes such as shale gas extraction and nuclear waste disposal. The growing interest in developing such enginee-ring applications has led to the need to characterize the geomechanical behaviour of shales.

During the period 2012-2013, the LMS focused on several aspects of the geomechanical behaviour of shales. The investigation of the water retention pro-perties of shales has been successfully addressed. This refers to the understanding of the capabilities of shales to retain water at different suction values . The water retention behavior together with the de-tection of the volume variation (swelling and shrin-kage) of the material can provide significant infor-mation for practical applications, where the material is exposed to different values of relative humidity during operational procedures like tunnel excava-tion or drilling operations. The effects of a reduc-tion of the earth pressure on the shales during the construction of a nuclear waste repository, for ins-tance, constitute a valuable mechanical issue. Fur-thermore, stress variations can significantly affect

shale porosity and permeability. As a consequence, the mechanical behaviour of shales at high confi-ning stresses is a fundamental aspect that has to be investigated. Advanced testing devices have been developed at LMS to analyse the hydro-mechanical behaviour of shales at high confining stresses and in non-isothermal unsaturated conditions.

Another fundamental aspect is the chemical effects on the mechanical behaviour of the material. Dif-ferent fluid solutions are nowadays considered during drilling and fracturing operation. The LMS is currently investigating the influence of pore water composition on the mechanical behaviour of the material. The mentioned points altogether form an advanced unitary framework for the analysis of the thermo-hydro-chemo-mechanical behaviour of shales.

research ToPic

geomechanics of shaLes

reLevanT PubLicaTions

Favero V., Ferrari A. and Laloui L. Retention Properties and Permeability of Shales. Géotechnique Symposium in Print 2013, London, UK, 2013.

Favero V., Ferrari A. and Laloui L. An Insight into the Fluid Retention Capabilities of Shales. International Workshop on Geomechanics and Energy, Lausanne, Switzerland, 2013.

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Deep geological repositories are considered as the most suitable solution for the disposal of radioactive wastes. According to National Cooperative for dis-posal of Nuclear Waste in Switzerland (NAGRA), the volume of low and intermediate-level waste that are predicted for a 50-year period can reach 93’000 m3. Among this volume, 60’000 m3 are coming from the operation and dismantling of the five Swiss nuclear power plants and 33’000 m3 from research, industry and medicine.

Among several repository concepts, bentonites are selected as the buffer component of the engi-neered barrier systems to be emplaced between the waste canisters and the host rock. The buffer material involved in the confinement of radioactive waste will be submitted to drastic thermal, hydrau-lic and mechanical modifications. These modifica-tions may significantly influence the behaviour of the buffer material in both macroscopic and micros-copic scales. Safety assessment of the entire repo-sitory depends on the deep understanding of the thermo-hydro-mechanical (THM) evolutions of the buffer material under such circumstances.

Following the requirements for characterization of the bentonite material properties in engineered barrier systems for disposal of radioactive wastes in Switzerland, a research program was established at the LMS. The use of comprehensive experimen-

tal techniques allowed the assessment of the ma-terial behaviour under thermo-hydro-mechanical processes. The observations on the behavioural features of the material at macroscopic and micros-copic scales provided a sound basis for the deve-lopment of a water retention model to account for the hydro-mechanical coupling and the micro-scale transformations. Therefore, the research addresses the issue from three main perspectives: the macros-copic behaviour, microstructural evolution and the constitutive modelling:

(i) Macroscopic behaviour: a systematic protocol was carried out to evaluate the behavioural features of the MX-80 granular bentonite under different thermo-hydro-mechanical stress paths. The water retention behaviour of the buffer material (an im-portant element of the hydro-mechanical coupling) was determined with a newly developed technique called Micro-cell.

(ii) Microstructural evolution: in the light of the microstructural investigation techniques and the development of a new technique (Micro-cell), an insight into the fabric evolution of the bentonite material at different hydraulic states along the wa-ter retention domain was achieved. This way, the hydro-mechanical response of the material was lin-ked to the evolution of the microstructure along the water retention curves.

research ToPic

nucLear wasTe sTorage

9Numerical model simulating an Engineered Barrier System; potential host construction for nuclear waste.

(iii) Constitutive modeling: following the experi-mental characterisation of the granular bentonite, a conceptual water retention model accounting for the change of the void ratio and the microstructu-ral evolutions during the hydration of the bentonite material was developed. The model is based on an elasto-plastic approach that used a linear anisotro-pic hardening rule. The model produces the water retention curves for the entire hydraulic domain under a given compaction state considering the evolution of microstructural porosity within the material.

reLevanT PubLicaTions

Seiphori A. Thermo-hydro-mechanical Characterisa-tion and Modelling of MX-Bentonite. PhD thesis, EPFL 2014, thesis directors Prof. Lyesse Laloui, Dr. Alessio Ferrari

Seiphoori A., Ferrari A. and Laloui L. An advanced calibration process for a thermo-hydro-mechanical triaxial system. International Symposium on Defor-mation Characteristics of Geomaterials, Séoul, South Korea, August 31- Sept. 2, 2011

Dupray F., Li C. and Laloui L. THM coupling sensitivity analysis in geological nuclear waste storage, in Engi-neering Geology, vol. 163, p. 113-121, 2013.

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reLevanT PubLicaTions Mimouni T., Laloui L. “Towards a secure basis for the design of geothermal piles”. Acta Geotechnica, Volume 9, Issue 3, pp. 355-366, 2014.

Dupray F., L. Laloui, Kazangba A. «Numerical analysis of sea-sonal heat storage in an energy pile foundation». Computers and Geotechnics, Vol. 55, pp. 67-77, 2014.

Mimouni T., Lei L., L. Laloui «Estimating soil thermal diffu-sivity with interference analyses». Acta Geotechnica, Doi 10.1007/s11440-014-0325-0, 2014.

Mimouni T., F. Dupray, L. Laloui “Estimating the geothermal potential of heat exchanger anchors on a cut and cover tunnel” Geothermics, N°51, pp. 380-387, 2014.

Dupray F., Chao L., L. Laloui «Heat-exchanger piles for the de-icing of bridges». Acta Geotechnica, Volume 9, Issue 3, pp. 413-423, 2014.

The research team of the Laboratory of Soil Mechanics has developed and used advanced numerical mo-dels that are able to reproduce the complex behaviour of energy geostructures.

Numerical models are powerful tools to investigate the behaviour of energy geostructures. These engi-neering systems have both the role of structural sta-bility and energy supplier. In the case of pile foun-dations, for instance, the loading coming from the building is transmitted to the soil through them im-posing a mechanical solicitation. At the same time, the piles exchange heat with the ground based on the principle of shallow geothermics and thus the thermal aspects also play a fundamental role. Last but not least, geostructures are, by definition, em-bedded in the soil, which is a porous material that can be fully or partially water-saturated.

The problem of analyzing the response of the whole soil-geostructure system is complex and involves three main aspects: mechanical, thermal and hydraulic, which are also coupled. Therefore, temperature variations could affect the mechanical response or induce excess pore water pressures. To address these issues, the coupled thermo-hydro-mechanical numerical analysis is used.

The research group of the Laboratory of Soil Mecha-nics is recognized at an international level for its contribution to this field. Our studies have permit-ted the analysis of the long-term effect of seasonal

temperature variations and extreme loading condi-tions on energy geostructures. This work includes not only the investigations on energy piles, but also other energy geostructures, such as bored tunnels, cut-and-cover tunnels and bridge foundations.

research ToPic

geoThermaL resources: numericaL simuLaTions

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The Laboratory of Soil Mechanics has developed a system to issue early-warning alerts for landslides. The early-warning system is a numerical prediction tool for shallow landslide hazards. It simulates the physical process in the soil during the landslide trig-ging and can predict the moment and the location of landsliding. The following input data is needed for a simulation: the internal factors, i.e. the proper-ties of soil that could be obtained through labora-tory tests, and the external trigger, i.e. rainfall fore-casting values. It is also possible to combine the tool with field measurements. For instance, if the water pressure is measured during a rainfall event in the field, these measurements could be introduced into the system and the result of the prediction should be come more realistic.

Within the numerical tool, the material behaviour is governed by an elasto-plastic constitutive mo-del, which is able to simulate the infiltration of rain

into unsaturated soil and the hysteretic behavior of water retention. Finite element method is used to solve the coupled equations of soil mechanics and hydraulics. It provides strain and pore pressure maps about the soil domain, from which the posi-tion of sliding surface as well as the sliding time can be deduced.

The early-warning system has been validated by the field experiment of landslide at Rüdlingen (Eiche-berger et al. 2011) and is being so far applied on the slope stability of the Irazu volcano in Costa Rica (Eicheberger et al. 2012). In this case, the early war-ning system provides threshold values for rainfall events as well as for pore water pressure. This is also an incredible tool that supports the decision-ma-king process.

Concisely, the system is fully functional and emits warnings as soon as the probability of slope unsta-bility reaches the critical value.

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LandsLide anaLysis

Article on the early-warning system for landslide predictions:«Predicting the unpredictable»Flash newspaper, May 2013

Relevant Publications

Eichenberger J. , Ferrari A. and Laloui L. Early warning thresholds for partially saturated slopes in volcanic ashes, in Computers and Geotechnics, p. 79-89, 2013.

Eichenberger L. and Laloui L. (Dir.). Geomechanical modelling of rainfall-induced landslides in partially saturated slopes. Thèse EPFL, n° 5580

Eichenberger J., Nuth M. and Laloui L. Modeling the Onset of Shallow Landslides in Partially Saturated Slopes Subjected to Rain Infiltration. Geo-Frontiers 2011 Conference, ASCE, Dallas, Texas, USA, March 13-16, 2011.

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The LaboraTory

Team PicTure

The LMS staff has grown over the last years:

2013

20092008

201220112010

23

21

2024

26

29

Staff

2013

20092008

201220112010

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766 10

10

PhDsCandidates

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a TooL To assess surface uPLifT during CO2 injecTion A new pre-design tool has been developed at the Laboratory of Soil Mechanics to support industries and other stakeholders in their projects.

CO2 saturation, displacement and temperature profile within a pressu-rized aquifer simulated by finite element simulator.

research ToPic

geoLogic co2 sequesTraTion

A multicomponent hydromechanical coupled mo-del has been implemented into a Finite Element code with the emphasis on the deformable porous media with the two-phase flow: supercritical CO2 and water. Numerical simulations show that injec-tion induced overpressure is the main trigger of geomechanical instabilities such as caprock defor-mation and surface uplift. Nonetheless, such de-tailed studies require a lot of preparation and cal-culation time

In order to facilitate the realization of these studies, the LMS has developed a tool that aims at helping project designers and reservoir engineers to have a first estimation of overpressure magnitude, CO2 propagation velocity, sealing caprock deformation and surface uplift during the injection of CO2. Provi-ded information can be obtained in a really fast and robust way before establishing any detailed models. The tool is based on a semi-analytical approach that examines the interaction between a primary caprock and adjacent regions with elastic material properties, which is induced by the pressurization

within the injection zone. It also incorporates a mo-ving front of two immiscible fluids: water and super-critical CO2. Transient effects in fluid pressures and real fluid properties are also taken into account, which can better determine spatial distribution and temporal evolution of the overpressure within the aquifer. The minimum number of parameters is required as inputs of the pre-design tool and the calculation is ultrafast compared to other numerical simulations.

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exPerimenTaL acTiviTies

The objective of the LMS laboratory research rela-ted to safe geologic carbon dioxide sequestration is characterization of thermo-hydro-mechanical behaviour of possible host and cap rocks in contact with water, brine, supercritical and liquid CO2.

Change in parameters governing the poromecha-nical response of sandstones and limestones is caused by the chemical effect of carbon dioxide on the rock matrix and is measured in triaxial and oedometric compression tests. Additionally, X-ray Computed Tomography, Scanning Electron Microscopy, and Mercury Intrusion Porosimetry techniques allow for studying the micro-structural transformations of the host rocks.

Safety of the sealing of possible host reservoirs is assessed by the investigation of mechanical and retention properties of cap rock material. Experi-ments with shales are focused on measurements of CO2 permeability, breakthrough pressure and retention behaviour. X-ray CT scans of a limestone specimen after par-

tial dissolution of calcite matrix (obtained @ UNIL)

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research

Ph.d. Theses

Ph.D. works concluded in 2012 and 2013:

• Suzanne Fauriel (2012) « Multiphysical model-ling of soils with a focus on microbially induced calcite precipitation ». Nominated for the EPFL award of best Ph.D. thesis in 2012.

• John Eichenberger (2013) « Geomechanical mo-delling of rainfall-induced landslides in partially saturated slopes ».

Ph.D. candidates are coming to the EPFL from all over the world to carry on their studies. Here are the Ph.D. theses that are currently ongoing at the Laboratory of Soil Mechanics:

• Thermo-mechanical aspects of energy piles: Alice Di Donna, thesis director: Prof. Lyesse Laloui

• Thermo-hydro-mechanical characterization and modelling of MX-80 granular bentonite: Ali Sei-phoori, thesis directors: Prof. Lyesse Laloui, Dr. Alessio Ferrari

• Gas flow propagation and related chemo-hydro-mechanical response of sand bentonite mixture: Donatella Manca, thesis director: Prof. Lyesse Laloui

• Energy pile foundations: group effect and long term behaviour: Thomas Mimouni, thesis direc-tor: Prof. Lyesse Laloui

• Thermo-hydro-mechanical characterization of shales: Valentina Favero, thesis directors: Prof. Lyesse Laloui, Dr. Alessio Ferrari

• Multiphase thermo-hydromechanical processes induced by CO2 injection into deep saline aqui-

fers: Chao Li, thesis director: Prof. Lyesse Laloui• Hydro-mechanical damage model for aniso-

tropic shales (Opalinus Clay): constitutive and numerical modelling: Francesco Parisio, thesis director: Prof. Lyesse Laloui

• Geomechanical constitutive model for bio-im-proved soils: Dimitrios Terzis, thesis director: Prof. Lyesse Laloui

• Gas testing in shales: Alberto Minardi, thesis di-rectors: Prof. Lyesse Laloui, Dr. Alessio Ferrari

• Behaviour of geomaterials in contact with CO2 in the framework of carbon sequestration: Timur Oscar Gökok, thesis director: Prof. Lyesse Laloui

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Lms in The

media

Our fields of expertise are of great professional and inter-national interest and our growing activities are covered in

the media. The chart depicts the increasing presence of LMS through articles and interviews in newspapers and radio

broadcasts since 2011.

From top left and clockwise:>Article in the Swiss newspaper «24heures»

>Article about Shale Gas published in Efficience21>Prof. Laloui has been interviewed by Babylone and Nancy Ypsilantis (RTS)

>The LMS technology in the Swiss Tech CC in newspaper «24heures» >Interview of Prof. Laloui in the Swiss Engineering Magazine.

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1. Laloui L. “Bio- and chemo-mechanical processes in geo-technical engineering”. Géotechnique, pp. 189-190, 2013.

2. Ferrari A. and Laloui L. “Advances in the Testing of the Hydro-mechanical Behaviour of Shales”. Multiphysical Testing of Soils and Shales, 2013 Springer.

3. Mimouni T. and Laloui L. “Towards a secure basis for the design of geothermal piles”. Acta Geotechnica, doi: 10.1007/s11440-013-0245-4, 2013.

4. Eichenberger J., Ferrari A. and Laloui L. “Early warning

thresholds for partially saturated slopes in volcanic ashes”. Computers and Geotechnics, pp. 79-89, 2013.

5. Witteveen P., Ferrari A. and Laloui L. «An experimental and constitutive investigation on the chemo-mechanical behaviour of a clay». Géotechnique, 63, No. 3, 244–255, 2013.

6. Fauriel S. and Laloui L. «A bio-chemo-hydro-mechanical model for microbially induced calcite precipitation in soils». Computers & Geotechnics, 46, 104–120, 2012.

Lms PubLicaTions and inTernaTionaL evenTs

During 2012 and 2013, 39 peer reviewed articles and conference papers were published by the LMS group. Here are some key publications among them:

2. “Geotechnical Analysis of Energy Geo-Structures”. Euro-pean Geothermal Congress 2013, Pisa (Italy), June 2013 - Prof Lyesse Laloui.

3. “Coupled analytical and numerical solutions of CO2 injection induced surface uplift and caprock deflection”. 3rd Sino-German Conference on Underground storage of CO2 and Energy, Goslar (Germany), May 2013 - Prof Lyesse Laloui.

4. “Advances in the analysis of thermo-active foundations and underground structures”. International Workshop on Thermo-active Geotechnical Systems for Near-Surface Geothermal Energy, Lausanne (Switzerland), March 2013 - Prof Lyesse Laloui.

5. “An experimental and constitutive investigation on the chemo-mechanical behaviour of a clay”, Géotechnique SIP 2013, 3 June 2013 at the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) in London. - Dr. Alessio Ferrari.

keynoTe LecTures

Main Keynote Lectures delivered by LMS people:

1. “Hydro-mechanically Coupled Processes in Rainfall-in-duced Landslide Modelling”. XVI French-Polish Collo-quium of Soil and Rock Mechanics, Montpellier (France), July 2013 - Prof Lyesse Laloui.

ciTaTions:Since 2009 LMS publications have been cited 1253 times (source: Scopus as of June 2014)The above chart presents the citations per year.

6. “Hydrogeological hazard and risk modeling techniques» session of the VIII National Conference «GIT-Geology and Information Technology», Chiavenna (So), 17 - 19 August 2013. - Dr. Alessio Ferrari.

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International conferences and workshops are of a great interest for the Laboratory of Soil Mechanics as they provide a platform to share information and know-how.

Discover the four main events that we organized.

Thermoactive Geotechnical Systems (2013) - photo

The Laboratory of Soil Mechanics organized an international workshop dedicated to Thermoactive Geotechnical Systems for Near-Surface Geothermal Energy at Lausanne-EPFL on 25-27 March 2013. The scientific organisation has been shared with VirginiaTech, University of Cambridge and University of Colorado - Boulder. The workshop has been funded by the US NSF.

EAGE International Workshop on Geomechanics and Energy - The Ground as Energy Source and Storage (2013)

The most recent contributions of geomechanics to various fields of energy were discussed during this workshop held at the EPFL on 26-29 November 2013. The areas of interest were related to geomechanical application in the subsurface extraction of energy and the storage of various waste as well as CO2. A short course was delivered prior to the start of the workshop by Prof. Lyesse Laloui and Dr. Alessio Ferrari on the rheological behaviour of soils, shales and rocks under a variety of saturation conditions and temperatures.

Workshop on Advances in Multiphysical Testing of Soils and Shales (2012)

The ISSMGE TC-101 International Workshop on “Advances in Multphysical Testing of Soils and Shales (ATMSS)” was held in Lausanne, Switzerland on 3-5 September 2012. It was organized by Prof. Lyesse Laloui and Dr. Alessio Fer-rari at the EPFL. The workshop aimed at stimulating the debate on the advances in experimental geomechanics and contributions on unsaturated soil testing, nonisothermal experiments, shale testing, micro-scale investiga-tions and image analysis techniques were presented. Six theme lectures completed the programme.

Geotechnique Symposium in Print (2013)

The Géotechnique Symposium in Print 2013 was held on June 3, 2013 at the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) in London. The Symposium was organized by Prof. Lyesse Laloui on the topic of “Bio- and Chemo- Mechanical Pro-cesses in Geotechnical Engineering”. The two issues of Géotechnique printed in March 2013 contain the 14 selected papers for the Symposium.

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ParTners and sPonsors

The Laboratory of Soil Mechanics and the Chair «Gaz Naturel» Petrosvibri would like to thank all their part-ners and sponsors whose support continues to be essential for the research activities conducted in our laboratory.

ALERT (EU), Chevron (USA), Competence Center on Environment and Sustainability (CCES, Switzerland), Competence Center on Energy and Mobility (CCEM, Switzerland), European Union FP6 - Marie Curie Ac-tions: Research Training Network, European Union FP7, EOS Holding (Switzerland), Holcim (Switzerland), National Cooperative for the Disposal of Radioactive Waste (NAGRA, Switzerland), National Science Foun-dation (Switzerland), Petrosvibri SA (Switzerland), Swiss Federal Office of Energy (OFEN), Swiss Federal Of-fice of Road (OFROU), and Swiss Federal Office of Topography - Swisstopo.

External financial support per research area.

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Alliance of Laboratories in Europe for Research and Technology

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The Team

LYESSE LALOUI

Director, Professor

LAURENT TACHER

Research associate and lecturer

GILBERT GRUAZ

ETS/HES Engineer

ALESSIO FERRARI

Senior Scientist

SERGIO SAMAT

Post-Doc Researcher

FABRICE DUPRAY

Post-Doc Researcher

SAMILA BANDARA

Post-Doc Researcher

ALESSANDRO ROTTA LORIA

PhD Student

ROMAN MAKHNENKO

Post-Doc Researcher

DIMITRIOS TERZIS

PhD Student

SEN QUIAN

PhD Student

YAFEI QIAO

PhD Student

ALBERTO MINARDI

PhD Student

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VALENTINA FAVERO

PhD Student

CHAO LI

PhD Student

THOMAS MIMOUNI

PhD Student

FRANCESCO PARISIO

PhD Student

DONATELLA MANCA

PhD Student

TIMUR GÖKOK

PhD student

PATRICK DUBEY

Technical assistant

ALI SEPHOORI

PhD Student

ROSANA TURIELLE

Secretary and administrative assistant

BARBARA TINGUELY

Secretary

JULIEN NOCERA

Laboratory Assistant

BASTIEN PASQUIER

Laboratory Assistant

JESSICA GARCIA

Commercial trainee

ALICE DI DONNA

PhD Student

LAURENT MORIER

Technical assistant

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ouTLook for The fuTure

The Laboratory of Soil Mechanics has a clear vision for its future and is working with passion to achieve it.

Apart from sub-surface topics (shallow geothermal resources, construction geomechanics, slopes stability, environmental geomechanics) a large part of our research converges toward deep geological medium and considers nuclear waste disposal, CO2 geologic sequestration and deep geothermal resources. It leads to the development of unique tools and knowledge concerning the processes taking place at the depth of a few kilometers.

Deep underground resources bring common opportunities and challenges and the LMS is becoming an international key player in this research field and aims at further establishing this role.

The LMS will continue to organize key international events. As a matter of fact, the EPFL will host the 13th Conference on Greenhouse Gas Control Technologiques (GHGT) in 2016, one of the most prestigious in-ternational conference series in this field. The conference will take place under the stewardship of the IEA Greenhouse Gas R&D Programme (IEAGHG), an international collaborative research program established in 1991 as an Implementing Agreement under the International Energy Agency (IEA). Professor Lyesse Laloui will be the co-chair and Dr. Alessio Ferrari will serve as a member of the organizing comittee of the conference. More than two thousand scientific researchers are expected to attend this event.

The LMS activities will continue to cover education, research and technology transfer in large fields of geomechanics. Our vision aims at contributing to a sustainable development of constructions and natu-ral environment by addressing selected key issues with the highest possible academic standard, through transdisciplinary internal and international collaborations and through collaboration with long-term re-search industries.

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PHOTOS

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