We have continued to hold well attended Webinars which are attracting international participants as well as connecting within Australasia.  Five Webinars have been held to-date and the ACigs Webinar team have an extensive programme of Webinars into 2020.  Joint platform Webinars with the Fabricated Geosynthetics Institute (FGI) have been presented further broadening interest.

IGS held their 2020 TC Reinforcement and TC Barriers Workshops in Barcelona 20-23rd January. World renowned speakers provided high level lectures with significant time allocated for delegates to participate in debate and discussion on contemporary topics.  There was a strong contingent of Australasian members participating including: Amir Shahkolahi, Graham Fairhead, Jonathan Shamrock, Malek Bouazza, Attila Marta and Siamak Paulson.  Siamak and Jonathan were part of the international organizing committee for this event and Jonathan is the TC Barriers committee secretary.  They have provided an event report which is included in this newsletter.

ACigs held a CQA practices review workshop in Melbourne during November 2019. The event was very well attended with a broad cross section of nationally based project stakeholders.  ACigs are now discussing a CQA practitioner qualifications proposal with several regulating bodies nationally. More details on this topic are covered later in the newsletter.

Planning for events in 2020 is now progressing with cautious a pace.  The first event, which was in March focused on Geomembranes.  A two-day workshop repeated in Brisbane and Melbourne, day one was addressed designing, specifying and constructing with PE geomembranes. Day two was an advanced workshop themed on durability.  Boyd Ramsey was the key presenter and for those that know Boyd he has a long career with Geomembranes and having worked for manufacturers and as a consultant has an exceptional breadth of subject knowledge, always providing informative and stimulating presentations.

The next planned event was in July 2020 and was to be focused on geosynthetics in reinforcement applications with Professor Jorge Zornberg and Professor Erol Tutumluer as the expert presenters.  With the current uncertain impact of Covid 19 in Australia and international travel issues this event has however been postponed until later in the year.

As a reminder 2020 membership subscriptions are due, if you haven’t yet renewed your membership you can do so on our website www.acigs.org.  As always please don’t hesitate to contact myself or any of the leadership team with suggestions or requests regarding member activities.

Graham Fairhead

President

Australasian Chapter

International Geosynthetics Society