I am just back from the latest TC250/SC7 meeting in Munich, held on Thursday 25th and Friday 26th July. This is the European committee responsible for producing and maintaining Eurocode 7 Parts 1 and 2.
Key issues discussed at the meeting included:
- Eurocode 7 Part 1 (EN 1997-1) has its first corrigendum (designated AC/2009) that includes a full replacement for Annex C (covering earth pressure coefficients)
- The first corrigendum to Eurocode 7 Part 2 (EN 1997-2) is nearly finished
- Ongoing work on theses standards is being undertaken by the Maintenance Group (MG), which has held nine teleconferences since that last SC7 meeting in Warsaw
- Members of the MG have prepared a paper entitled 'Eurocode 7 for geotechnical design - a model code for non-EU countries', which will be presented at the forthcoming International Conference on Soil Mechanics and Foundation Engineering in Alexandria in October
- Members of the MG have presented a paper on EQU at the recent International Symposium on Geotechnical Reliability at Gifu, Japan
- The MG is undertaking a survey (led by me, Andrew Bond) of Nationally Determined Parameters used in each country in Europe. Initial results suggest wide variation in partial factors adopted
- Another study (led by Brian Simpson)into the 'correct' interpretation of the rules given in Eurocode 7 for water pressures is also underway and promises interesting results
- A second set of design examples has been prepared by ETC10, the committee looking into the implementation of Eurocode 7 in Europe, and is set to go live early in July (more details will follow in my blog on this topic)
- Coordination of the forthcoming standards for execution and testing of anchorages (prEN 1537:20xx and prEN ISO 22477-5:20xx) is planned and will result in Section 8 of Eurocode 7 Part 1 (EN 1997-1) needing revision. More work for the MG!
- A new CEN committee has been set up to look at assessment of existing structures
- The next SC7 meeting will be held in Pavia, Italy in April 2010
