By Lynda Myer
Institution of Civil Engineers, 1 Great George Street, London SW1P 3AA. will host the in-Person evet of BTS on Thursday 15th June 2023 at 18:00 hrs.
While the main topic of this event is due to be “Design of Watertight Structures – Can we rely on the self-healing of cracks in concrete?”, Dr Carola Edvardsen,Technical Director of COWI, will present his speech.
In order to designing the watertight concrete structures such as basements, tunnels and water tanks exposed to one-sided water pressure, structural engineers commonly use EN 1992-3 Liquid retaining and containment structures BS 8102 as well as Ciria C775 . Although, due to e.g. EN 1992-3 one may interpret that for water retaining structures, leaking full depth cracks is allowed, in good faith designers believe that depending on the hydraulic gradient full depth cracks between 0.05 and 0.20 mm are acceptable. However, this is only the case if the cracks heal themselves effectively within a relatively short time. Unfortunately, the selfhealing of cracks does not always occur, and the reinforced concrete structures are at risk of serious reinforcement corrosion which could endanger the structural integrity without mitigation measures (e.g. injection).
Additionally, providing some insight in the design of watertight structures, the self-healing effect of cracks and the presenter’s own experience from several projects where relying on the self-healing of cracks as a design assumption had serious consequences for the structures, both with regard to durability and structural integrity, are going to be other contents of this presentation.
For following this in-person event as online please click here.
Determined time for serving the tea and coffee will be from 17:30 onwards and post lecture drinks and food will be served downstairs in the ICE bar and are sponsored by Webac.
For any further query please contact; The Secretary, BTS, Tel: 020 7665 2238 or e-mail: bts@ice.org.uk or visit this website.
