The 2020 Kersten Lecture by Prof. Lyesse Laloui

The Kersten Lecture is named in honor of Prof. Miles Kersten, whose main research activities focused on frost action in the design of highways. His bulletin “Thermal Properties of Soils” is still used worldwide for heat flow calculations in both frozen and unfrozen soils, and in whose honor the dimensionless number used in soil mechanics equations is named, the Kersten Number.

Prof. Lyesse Laloui presented the Kersten Lecture entitled: “Energy Geotechnology: A New Era for Geotechnical Engineering Practice”. Energy geotechnology provides low carbon, cost-effective and local energy solutions to structures and infrastructures, which opens a new era for geotechnical engineering practice, by extending the conventional role of structural design to that of addressing acute energy challenges of our century. The presentation reviews the methodology behind energy geotechnology by highlighting its scope and applications to various geostructures for structural support and energy supply of built environments. Aspects of primary importance for maximizing the energy, geotechnical, and structural performance of energy geostructures and solutions to address this challenge are presented. Moreover, analytical solutions and design tools, as well as performance-based design approaches for energy geostructures are introduced. The final goal being to uncover the potential of energy geotechnology on the path of less dependency on fossil fuels and to emphasize the critical role of geotechnical engineers to take full advantage of this technology.

Prof. Laloui’s lecture can be viewed through the attached link.