We’re delighted to report that Fred Baynes, our joint nominee with AGS, was successful in winning the Marcel Arnould Medal. Although Fred is based in Australia, we forgive him this transgression since he will be visiting New Zealand in the near future to deliver his highly regarded course on the development of engineering geological models.
The Marcel Arnould Medal was formally established at the 2014 IAEG Congress in Turin in recognition of people of significant repute within the IAEG and who have made a major contribution to the Association.
The decision was made by the IAEG Executive Committee at the online awards selection meeting held on May
30th, 2024. Through the voting by the Executive Committee members on three candidates, the Executive Committee decided to award the 2024 Marcel Arnould Medal to Dr. Fred Baynes for his significant contribution to the engineering geology profession in the region and his outstanding service to the Association.
Biography
Fred Baynes was educated in the UK where he obtained a BSc in geology from Bristol University, an MSc and DIC in engineering geology from Imperial College and a PhD from Newcastle University relating to research on weathered rocks. After working for a site investigation contractor in the UK for a couple of years, he migrated to Australia in 1980, where
to the present day he has worked as a consulting engineering geologist.
Fred is now an independent consultant engineering geologist with a continuing love of field work and is based in Central Victoria, Australia. He provides advice to major projects in the civil, mining and oil and gas sectors throughout the world. The advice provided invariably centres around “getting the geology right” and developing effective geological models of all
sorts to facilitate project delivery. Fred is a member of the IAEG and his involvement with the IAEG was as a member, as Vice President for Australasia from 2003 to 2006, President from 2007 to 2010, Immediate Past President from 2011 to 2014 and as Chair and member of several Commissions.
Vice President for Australasia
Fred was IAEG Vice President for Australasia between 2002 and 2006 and was subsequently elected President of the IAEG at the Nottingham Congress in 2006 and served in this capacity from 2007 to 2011.
As IAEG Vice President for Australasia, he actively represented the region at Council and was commissioned by the Executive to review the workings of the various Commissions. He concluded that new energy was required to increase the activity of these important “technical engines” of the IAEG. Fred advocated strongly on behalf of Australasian IAEG members at both the AGS and NZGS at a national level. He was instrumental in the development of a register of engineering geologists across Australasia and in the development of professional development courses in engineering geology for members both Australia and New Zealand.
IAEG President
During Fred’s IAEG Presidency, he re-energised the working of the Commissions and increased the number of active Commissions from four in 2002 to over 20 in 2010, which has resulted in many new contributions to the IAEG Bulletin and meetings.
During his presidency, Fred led meetings of the IAEG Executive and the Council in Vail, USA in 2007, in Madrid, Spain in 2008, in Chengdu, China in 2009 and finally at the IAEG Congress in Auckland, New Zealand in 2010. In addition, Fred travelled to Los Angeles, USA in 2007 to attend the AEG Annual meeting, to Seoul, Korea in 2008 to attend the 6th Asian Regional Conference. In 2009 Fred travelled to South Africa where he attended the Problem Soils Seminar and gave talks in Johannesburg, Durban and Cape Town and then to Brazil where he attended the 12th CBGE Regional Congress and gave talks in Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and Recife. These meetings with IAEG members around the world provided him valuable insights into the needs of the members During each year of his Presidency and as a Past President, Fred represented IAEG at meetings of the newly created Federation of International Geo-Engineering Societies and became increasingly concerned that the developing organization was not serving the interests of the ordinary members of IAEG and was involved in the decision in March 2010 to change to a smaller, less powerful FedIGS.
During Fred’s time as President, changes were initiated in the running of the IAEG and these changes continue to this day. Fred has attended every annual IAEG Council meeting as a Past President since the end of his tenure in up to 2022.
Commissions
Fred has chaired both Commission 4 on Education and Training and more recently was chair of the very successful and extremely influential Commission 25 on the Use of Engineering Geological Models.
Under Fred’s leadership and as co-author with Mr Stephen Parry, Commission 25 published in 2023 the Guidelines for the development of Engineering Geological models on Projects. These guidelines can be used around the world and bring great credit to the IAEG. This is highlighted by the recognition in the latest Euro-Code 7 where clear advice is now required on the use of a Ground Model and its interface with the Geotechnical Design Model.
These guidelines raise the profile of engineering geologists in the wider ground engineering industry and provide a basis for training engineering geologists and geotechnical engineers on how to develop and safely use models to successfully deliver projects.
Fred’s contribution to the engineering geology profession
Fred’s contribution to the engineering geological profession is wide reaching both geographically and in his influence on science and practice. He has an impressive publication record as a consultant, has a passion for teaching, is well recognised as an expert consultant and has a long, proud record of contributing to the governance of our profession. Through his work as a consultant, his teaching and his involvement in IAEG Fred is well known throughout the international community of engineering geologists and geotechnical engineers.
Fred has authored or co-authored 36 papers on site investigation techniques, dams, railways, tunnels, landslide risk assessment, the development of geological models for engineering projects and the fundamentals of engineering geology. Some of these, for example his work on the Total Engineering Geology Approach, are seminal papers in Engineering Geology and have set a standard by which engineering geology practice is undertaken today. A list of publications is included, with the three papers that Fred thinks are the most important highlighted. In his publications Fred has endeavoured to explore the basic principles which underlie good practice in engineering geology and demonstrate how high-quality engineering geological studies can contribute to projects. The approach that he advocates is to focus on field studies, concentrate on “getting the geology right” and develop effective geological models of all sorts to facilitate successful project delivery. The impact of Fred’s work on the profession is far reaching. For example:
- His work on the roles and responsibilities of engineering geologists has been used as
the basis for several professional competence standards around the world. - His publications on landslide risk management have contributed to national and
international guidelines in this field, for example, the Australian Geomechanics
Society Guidelines for Landslide Risk Management. - His work on Total Geological History is a seminal and widely adopted approach to
engineering geology around the world.
Fred continues to regularly teach geology to civil engineering undergraduates in the UK and to run professional development courses on engineering geology and geology for engineers for practitioners in Australia and New Zealand. He has also developed and delivered a variety of shorter professional development courses on landslides and logging rocks and soils. Many of these courses have an international attendance.
Recently he was a lead member of a working group that prepared a revision of Australian standard for geotechnical site investigations. The new Australian standard aligns with international developments and includes normative requirements for preparation of geological models for site investigation programs.
As a prominent engineering geologist Fred has been an invited speaker at conferences in Brazil, South Africa, United Kingdom, Hong Kong, New Zealand, Australia and the Czech Republic.