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March e.Geo

March 2020




In this issue:

  1. CPT Bootcamp SoCal - Last chance!
  2. Conference Speaker Release 4: Risking it all
  3. Silent Auction Donations - Help the students!
  4. Salary Survey call for data
  5. EP Meetings San Jose & Sacramento
  6. ICYMI: February Regional Meetings
  7. Welcome our New Members
  8. Upcoming Events - the e.Calendar

Last few spots going fast for the spring CPT Bootcamp

SoCal extended version on March 6th at the Courtyard Marriott Santa Ana, just off the 55 freeway at MacArthur.

More Options, More Learning:

To offer more learning opportunities for geo-professionals with varying degrees of CPT experience we have extended this course to a full day format.

AM Session:

Background on Cone Penetration Testing, data collected and soil parameters. If you are new to CPT - this is for you! Learn all about how the data is collected and how to calculate basic soil parameters and the soil behavior type.

A basic introduction to the software program, CPeT-IT will be included to cover importing files, looking at the data and basic parameter selection.

PM Session:

The afternoon session will take a deeper dive into analyzing CPT data for pile design and shallow foundations. More advanced features of CPeT-IT will be discussed and the course will move quickly.

CLiq will be introduced for liquefaction evaluation and case history examples will be used to work through.

Choose your path!

Register for just the AM, just the PM or come for the full day - its up to you!

Cost:

Half Day single session (AM or PM) $180 members, $300 non-members, $50 student members

Full Day (both AM and PM sessions) $300 members, $500 non-members, $100 student members

What's included:

Half day sessions will include either breakfast (AM session) or lunch (PM session) and breaks. Full day attendees will receive both breakfast and lunch.

Please plan to bring a laptop computer to follow along with the software. Free 7-day licenses will be available for both CPeT-IT and CLiq if you do not own the programs.

More information on CPeT-IT & CLiq available from Geologismiki's website.

REGISTER NOW


Conference Speaker Release 4 - Risking it all

We are celebrating 50 years of CalGeo at the Resort at Squaw Creek in beautiful Lake Tahoe April 22-24, 2020. Short courses available on Wednesday April 22nd.

PRINTABLE PROGRAM RELEASED! Download it here >>

There is so much in store for you - we always have the best social events, food and fun. Plus you will stay on-top of technical issues, risk and liability, legislative action and our economic forecast for the year to come.

Friday April 24th 8:30-11:45am Panel Session:

Panel Session & Workshop on Risk & Liability

We are putting together a case-history that highlights a number of issues affecting geo-professionals in California. Geotechnical Engineer of record, change in project scope, lawsuits and more! Work with your table-mates to highlight what went wrong and what went right in our case-history and then hear from our panel. Questions and discussion will be conducted after all panelists present their guidance and suggestions.

Moderator: Mr. Gius has over 30 years of experience as a project engineer, dating to his entry into the fields of geotechnical engineering and engineering geology in 1985. His extensive track record includes geotechnical and geologic studies for schools, hospitals, fire stations, commercial and industrial projects, and residential subdivisions. Mr. Gius has performed numerous site-specific ground response studies for earthquake analyses of structures, as well as forensic analyses of distressed structures throughout the Sacramento Valley.

Technical Expert: Mr. Silver has over 35 years of progressively responsible engineering and management experience in a wide variety of civil and geotechnical engineering projects. He has worked successfully for and with industrial, residential, and commercial developers, master community planners, and governmental agencies. He has extensive experience in landslide evaluation and remediation design, geotechnical instrumentation, residential and commercial development, public works projects, municipality consultation, mechanically stabilized earth walls, and forensic projects. In addition, he has served as an expert witness in regards to numerous
geotechnical and civil issues over the last 30 years.

Insurance Expert: Norah is an Account Executive in the design professional practice of Dealey, Renton & Associates. Norah has over 20 years’ experience as a commercial insurance broker; specializing in serving the design, engineering, and construction management industries. Norah provides unique solutions to challenging insurance matters, risk management & loss control services, and consultative assistance to insurance related business concerns. As the daughter of a civil engineer who owned his own practice, Norah was raised in an engineering office and understands the complexities of the business.

Legal Expert: The primary focuses of Mr. Jacobsen’s practice are professional liability and environmental matters. He is a frequent speaker at seminars involving design professionals, contractors and environmental issues. He specializes in the representation of architects, engineers and contractors in construction litigation. He has an extremely successful record in jury trials involving engineers/architects, environmental matters, personal injury, product liability, premises liability and construction defect claims.

Program & Registration LIVE

Hotel block almost sold out! Rooms can be added at group rate Tues - Thursday, Friday night is best available rate.

Already registered? Check-out our Survival Guide so you don't turn into the Donner party on your trip to Lake Tahoe.

Featuring:

  • How to get there and tips on travel
  • Weather expectations
  • What to wear to conference events
  • What our beautiful host hotel offers in amenities
  • Options for off-site activities, kids camps and more

Silent Auction Donations - Help the students!

Lets help our student chapters out by raising some funds at the 2020 Annual Silent Auction benefiting student chapters. Each year at our Annual Conference we sponsor student attendees by allowing each chapter to send two students for free. If a chapter wants to send more, we drastically reduce their registration fees to a nominal $100. This year we are making it easier for them to travel by also sponsoring a room at the host hotel for each chapter.

We also support each student chapter with a $500 donation towards their GeoWall team and new for 2020 we have implemented at $10,000 scholarship! The scholarship winners will be presented with their awards at the Anniversary Banquet.

To help off-set the costs of this and our other student support we are asking for donations to our silent auction that will be held during the 50th Anniversary Banquet and Celebration on Thursday April 23, 2020.

What is in store for the 50th Anniversary banquet you ask?

  • Mix and mingle with our Affiliate members at their tables and complete your Olympic bingo card for a chance to win $$CASH$$ and CalGeo swag.
  • Live music, excellent food stations and of course, open bar!
  • Peruse our selection of old salary surveys, annual conference programs and old photo albums and reminisce about the "good ole' days"
  • Welcome and short anniversary recap by Tom Wallace (Past President) and video montage by Don Shepardson (Past President & Founding Member)
  • Last but not least, check out our Silent Auction for fun experiences, packages, gift cards and more!

Download Donation Request letter with Tax ID HERE >>

E-mail Kelly Cabal with your intent to donate and arrange item delivery (either on-site or pre-conference)


Salary Survey 2019: Call for Data

Its that time again... warm up your fingers and get to do all that data entry. CalGeo is requesting all member firms submit data for our 2019 salary survey. This is for salaries and bonuses awarded in the calendar year of 2019. We hope to compile the data and release our survey in June.

Instructions for completing and submitting:

  • Download excel template HERE>>
  • Complete all 4 tabs in excel sheet. Note: Hard copy of survey will be mailed to name and address on 1st tab. Additional copies may be requested via e-mail for internal use only.
  • Only use job descriptions listed in YELLOW on survey. If the position is not shown, please leave off the survey.
  • Please enter location zone of where each employee works using our zone map or click the image at right (incomplete entries slow down processing time)
  • E-mail us with any questions!

Data due to [email protected] by May 1st! All submissions will remain strictly confidential.

Don't miss our 50th anniversary conference in Lake Tahoe this year where we will have salary survey's dating back to 1970 on display!

 


March Emerging Professional Meetings

- Sacramento & San Jose-

Now with two locations to choose from, join our fun Emerging Professional groups this month for great speakers, casual setting and some good grub.

March 17th - Bay Area Emerging Professional Meeting @ Langan office in San Jose

Presentation by: Dr. Kenichi Soga, UC Berkeley, Professor

Summary:

The design, construction, maintenance and upgrading of geotechnical infrastructure requires fresh thinking to minimize use of materials, energy and labor but to keep its resiliency against natural hazards. This can only be achieved by understanding the actual performance of the infrastructure, both during its construction and throughout its design life, through innovative monitoring. Advances in sensor systems offer intriguing possibilities to radically alter methods of condition assessment and monitoring of infrastructure. In this talk, it is hypothesized that the future of infrastructure relies on smarter information; the rich information obtained from embedded sensors within infrastructure will act as a catalyst for new design, construction, operation and maintenance processes for integrated infrastructure systems linked directly with user behavior patterns and city-scale modeling.

Bio: Kenichi Soga is the Donald H. McLaughlin Chair in Mineral Engineering and a Chancellor’s Professor at the University of California, Berkeley. He is also a faculty scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

Cost: $26 Professionals (includes $6 parking validation), Students FREE

Program:

6:00pm Dinner & Registration

6:30-7:30pm Presentation

RSVP for Bay Area Meeting HERE >>

March 18th - Sacramento Area Emerging Professionals Meeting @ GEI's office in Rancho Cordova

A new design method for working platforms stabilized by multi-axial geogrid

Presented by: Lees, A.S., Senior Application Technology Manager, Tensar International, Nicosia, Cyprus Fountain, G., West Area Engineer, Tensar Corporation, San Diego, CA.

Join the Sacramento EP group on Wednesday March 18th for their monthly meeting.

The meetings will alternate between GEI's Rancho Cordova office and the North Natomas library.

Summary:

The design of working platforms typically involves the calculation of a two-layer bearing capacity. Existing calculation models are quite empirical with imprecise input parameters while other proposed methods have tended to involve multiple design charts and been suited to either strip or circular foundations only. It has also been difficult to incorporate the benefits of geogrid in an accurate way. The recently developed “T-Value Method” defines bearing capacity simply in terms of the ratio of strengths of the two layers and can be applied to both clay and sand subgrades. It also allows realistic incorporation of the benefit of multi-axial stabilizing geogrid in terms of the enhanced shear strength of the upper granular layer. This is leading to significant cost savings due to thinner working platforms that are designed in a safe and scientifically rigorous way. The greater ductility of stabilized granular layers also provides greater assurance that the assumed failure mechanisms can be fully mobilized before strain softening in the granular layer occurs. This paper summarizes the development of this design new method and describes some of the full-scale field tests that have been used in its validation.

Program:

6:30pm Registration and casual dinner

7:15-8:00pm Presentation

Cost: $20 Professionals, Students Free!

Please RSVP to Sacramento meeting by March 17th HERE >>


ICYMI: February's Regional Meeting Recap

If you weren't able to join us for our early February regional meetings with Dr. Ross Boulanger, not to worry. We are here to recap all the fun!

Access our Members Club page to download a PDF of his slides for both his NorCal presentation and his EERI Distinguished lecture he gave the following week in San Diego.

We were excited to join up with EERI and ASCE-GI chapters in San Diego for the sold out February 11th talk. A big THANK YOU to Project X Corrosion Engineering for sponsoring that event and bringing some really cool pens that put ours to shame. If you want your own pen featuring a ruler, level and hidden screwdriver in the stylus, give Ed Hernandez a call and he can hook you up.


Welcome CalGeo's Newest Members

We are pleased to welcome a few new members to the CalGeo family this month:

Slate Geotechnical offers the latest techniques in geotechnical engineering, dam and levee safety, seismic hazard, and geohazard assessment. Our geotechnical practice includes a full range of services from site investigation and characterization to performance-based foundation evaluations. We strive to be innovative and implement cutting edge techniques in all of our practice areas. Slate has offices in Oakland and South Lake Tahoe, California.

Haley & Aldrich partners with our clients, not only providing the technical services required for construction and remediation projects, but also expert guidance on handling the critically important soft challenges inherent to a project, from shifting regulations to abutters’ issues. We strive to understand all the stakeholders and what they value, and then provide thoughtful, creative solutions that enable our commercial, industrial, public and institutional, transportation and energy sector clients to succeed.


The e.Calendar & Upcoming Events - The Geo-Calendar

Quick Browse: SoCal events in ORANGE, NorCal events in GREEN

CalGeo Events & Deadlines:

March 6, 2020: SoCal CPT Bootcamp, Santa Ana

March 12, 2020: ASCE Cross Country Lecture @ UCSD, San Diego

March 12, 2020: ASCE-GI Inland Empire Dinner Meeting on Seismic Updates in the 2019 CBC and CGS Note 48, Rancho Cucamonga

March 17, 2020: Bay Area EP Meeting, San Jose

March 18, 2020: Sacramento Area EP Meeting, Sacramento

March 31, 2020: Regular registration & Hotel deadline for Annual Conference

April 2-3, 2020: Rocscience Short course on 2D Numerical Modelling, Los Angeles

April 22, 2020: Roscience Short courses @ Annual Conference, Lake Tahoe

April 22, 2020: Prevailing Wage Short course @ Annual Conference, Lake Tahoe

April 22-24, 2020: CalGeo's Annual Conference & 50th Anniversary! You don't want to miss this one. Cross your fingers for some good snow and skiing at Squaw Valley, Lake Tahoe