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Geotechnical News • December 2013
45
There appears to be an ever-increasing
range of geotechnical engineering
problems where the application of
unsaturated soil mechanics is relevant.
Originally, the primary focus was on
the behaviour of expansive or swelling
soils. Slope stability problems were of
concern because of the close linkage
between weather-related conditions
and the failure of slopes. Later, our
concerns extended to environmen-
tal engineering and sustainability.
Contaminant transport problems were
often dominant near the ground sur-
face where the soils were unsaturated.
Soil cover designs became a particu-
larly fruitful area where unsaturated
soil mechanics principles could be
applied through numerical model-
ing. More recently, there has been an
increase in unsaturated soil applica-
tions related to the mining industry.
Unsaturated soil mechanics theories
can be applied to waste rock and
tailings materials, heap leach opera-
tions, solid waste facility operations
and other situations where there is an
interaction between the weather and
the ground surface materials.
As society demands greater environ-
mental accountability and sustain-
ability, particularly for the resource
extraction industries, it becomes
increasingly necessary to be able to
simulate processes involving unsatu-
rated soils near the ground surface. As
a practitioner who continuously deals
with unsaturated soils in engineering
design and research, this latest book
has become a crucial and fundamental
reference for me. “Unsaturated Soil
Mechanics in Engineering Practice”,
by D. G. Fredlund, H. Rahardjo and
M. D. Fredlund is an essential and rich
guide for geotechncial engineering
practice, which I strongly recommend.
John Wiley & Sons; 926 pages;
Hardcover is $138.35; Kindle is
$87.99. Available from Amazon.ca
BOOK REVIEW