Topical Collection on "Sustainable Management of the Built Environment Prone to Natural Hazard Risks"

A topical collection of Prevention and Treatment of Natural Disasters (PTND) (E-ISSN: 2753-7544).
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 10 October 2024

Collection Editor:

Prof. Dr. Ancuta Rotaru
Department of Transportation Infrastructure and Foundations, Faculty of Civil Engineering and Building Services, "Gheorghe Asachi" Technical University of Iași, 700050 Iași, Romania
Interests: sustainability of soil reuse in civil engineering; sustainability and resilience analysis in slope stabilization; geotechnical engineering for risk mitigation and stabilization; sustainable practices in geoenvironmental engineering; site investigation; foundation design for sustainable substructures, eco-friendly materials for sustainable rehabilitation of substructure works

Topical Collection Information:

Dear Colleagues,

This topical collection provides cutting-edge engineering practice and current research data to support the sustainable design, construction, operation, and maintenance of substructures and structures associated with natural hazards. It is intended to help researchers and practitioners to design and build resilient structures under challenging conditions (earthquakes, landslides, floods, etc.) while optimizing designs and minimizing maintenance costs.

Structure-soil interaction has to be considered in many cases of management of constructions in areas dealing with natural hazards and this involves interactions between structural and geotechnical engineering. However, the different approaches among structural engineers and geotechnical engineers often make understanding difficult. This topical collection explores why differences occur, and addresses a variety of geotechnical and structural engineering topics as they apply to buildings, bridges, transportation infrastructure, and other types of construction prone to natural hazard risks. Modeling constructions as a process that idealizes their real behavior in terms of geometry, material properties and loads to make them suitable for analysis and assessment demonstrated that geotechnical and structural modeling differs significantly from traditional modeling in regions susceptible to natural risks. This topical collection shows that concepts such as ductility and robustness ground the success of both structural and geotechnical modeling of structures built in areas with natural hazard risks. The importance of a clear understanding of behavioral mechanisms prior to detailed analysis is also illustrated through case studies, particularly in relation to new design and construction techniques to mitigate natural hazard risks.

Topics include sustainable geotechnical/ structural hazard risk mitigation, design and maintenance, structural durability/ vulnerability in areas with natural hazard risk, HBIM-based structural analysis, modeling, simulation and optimization, seismic survey, cultural heritage preservation and restoration.

Dynamic building generation and regeneration are presented as processes of remediating the current vicious geotechnical and structural impacts through a sustainable building process. By bringing together the diversity of situations, interests, design styles, techniques, and more, the journal aims to find integrating mechanisms that accelerate the decision-making processes in building from a theoretical and practical perspective. Also, this collection includes empirical or conceptual studies that initiate a line of investigation or introduce new methods/ concepts in geotechnical and structural engineering.

Prof. Dr. Ancuța Rotaru
Collection Editor

Keywords:

Hazard risk mitigation in structures and substructures through case scenario approach
Earthquake damage and reconstruction
Geotechnical techniques for hazard risk mitigation
Structural durability/ vulnerability in areas with natural hazard risk
Post-disaster dynamic building generation and regeneration
Cultural heritage preservation and restoration
Eco-friendly materials for sustainable geotechnical and structural works
Innovative IoT technologies for geotechnical and structural monitoring

Manuscript Submission Information:

Please visit the Submissions Guidelines page before submitting a manuscript. Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Manuscripts should be submitted online through the online manuscript submission and editorial system. Additionally, please include a cover letter specifying that the manuscript is intended for the Topical Collection "Sustainable Management of the Built Environment Prone to Natural Hazard Risks" when submitting it online. Manuscripts can be submitted until the submission deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal and will be listed together on the Topical Collection website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract can be sent to the Editorial Office ptnd@ukscip.com for announcement on this website.

The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 600 USD. Authors who are unable to cover this cost or those who are invited to submit papers may be eligible for discounts or waivers.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process.

Published Papers:

This Topical Collection is now open for submission.

Planned Paper Information:

1: Title: Applicability of Aerial and Satellite Images to Geotechnical Caracterization of Sites: Assessment of Groundwater Flow

Abstract: Nowadays, the usage of aerial and satellite images has a wide applicability in the geotechnical assessment of future investment sites. The paper aims to present a case study of the potential for using aerial and satellite images to characterize groundwater in an area. The factors presented in the study highlight that the assessment of an area using aerial and satellite images can be useful for accurately determining the extent of geotechnical investigations required to design optimal technical solutions, avoiding additional costs that may arise due to technological risks caused by actual geotechnical characteristics of the area.

2: Title: Approaches for Identifying the Causes of Landslides from Seciurile, Gorj County, Romania, Using Aerial and Satellite Images

Abstract: On the night of May 4/5, 2006, a landslide seriously affected an entire locality in southwestern Romania. According to the amplitude of the phenomenon, covering an area of approx. 1,000,000 sqm, but also by the scale of the physical destruction recorded, this was an event that Romania had not faced up to that time. Located south of the Carpathian Mountains, in an area marked by the presence of large lignite mines, the situation of the village of Seciurile, Gorj County, Romania, proved to be exceptional, not only because of the scale and impact of the phenomenon but also because of how the authorities got involved in determining the causes of the major landslide and determining the solutions that need to be taken to overcome its consequences. Initially, it was suspected that mining activity in the area could cause the landslide phenomenon. Both the reaction of the authorities and the determination of the causes of the phenomenon by a number of experts and research institutes have led to a legitimate loss of trust among the people, which was much more complicated and lasting than the landslide phenomenon. Thus, later it came to the situation where the residents and civic associations of the village of Seciurile asked the court for help in deciding that mining activities were the cause of the landslide to oblige mining companies and authorities pay compensation. However, the technical truth seems to be totally different.