International Society for Rock Mechanics and Rock Engineering (ISRM)
Report for New Zealand – December 2022
ISRM Congress 2027 Hosting Bid Update:
Paul Horrey, Stuart Read and Romy Ridl attended the 2022 ISRM International Symposium held in conjunction with the IX Latin American Congress on Rock Mechanics, Rock Testing and Site Characterization in Asuncion, Paraguay on October 12-19, 2022. At the ISRM Council meeting we presented our bid to host the 16th ISRM International Congress in 2027 in Christchurch. Other bidders for the event were South Korea and China. Following a vote of the ISRM Council the successful bidder was South Korea. While it was disappointing to miss out the Korean presentation and offering was of a very high standard and we are confident they will host an impressive event. We did receive a number of compliments on our presentation which we felt was comparable to the winning submission. Many useful lessons were learned, not the least of which is that these bids are a long game, this being South Korea’s third consecutive bid to host an ISRM Congress! The organising committee of Paul Horrey, Stuart Read, Eleni Gkeli, Romy Ridl and Christoph Kraus is grateful of the support of NZGS members, Christchurch Convention Bureau and Tourism New Zealand during the preparation of the bid and is assessing next steps with regard to bidding to host future ISRM flagship events.
Board and Council Meetings:
The 2022 ISRM Board, Commissions and Council meetings were held in Asuncion, Paraguay during LARMS 2022 on 15-16 October.
ISRM Membership:
ISRM Membership is at an all time high at 8911 individual members, 174 Corporate Members with 58 National Groups represented.
Memberships trends can be seen in the graphic below.
ISRM Awards:
A number of awards were announced at the Council Meeting in Asuncion.
Muller Award:
Derek Martin of Canada was selected as the recipient of the four yearly Muller Award in recognition of distinguished contribution to rock mechanics and rock engineering
Rocha medal 2023 –
Winner: Jun Zhao, from China, with the thesis “Study on time-dependent failure mechanism and long-term stability of hard rock in deep buried tunnel” presented at the Northeastern University, China.
Runner-up: Rupesh Verma, from India, with the thesis “A combined theoretical-experimental-numerical approach to characterization and modelling of rock fracture and rock burst” presented at the University of Adelaide, Australia.
Runner-up: Cyrille Couture, from Canada, with the thesis “Mechanical characterization of porous sandstones in true triaxial conditions: diffuse and localized deformation, effect of anisotropy” presented at the Université Grenoble Alpes, France.
John Hudson Rock Engineering Award 2022:
This award is conferred on individual or corporate members of the ISRM in recognition of achievements in engineering practice and was given to Dr Christine Detournay, USA.
Science Achievement Award 2022:
This award recognizes outstanding contributions to science and technology in the field of rock mechanics and rock engineering, and was conferred on Prof. Jean Sulem, nominated by the NG France.
Young Rock Engineer Award 2022:
This award acknowledges excellence in the field of rock engineering by ISRM members who are in early stages of their career and was conferred on Dr Yota Togashi, nominated by the NG Japan.
Key International Symposia 2022-4
2023 ISRM 15th International Congress, Salzburg, Austria 9-14 October 2023. Abstracts closed 31 October 2022. At the Council meeting it was decided that the 2024 ISRM International Symposium will be held in New Delhi, India. Other regional events and specialised events are listed on the ISRM website.
Newsletter
The latest ISRM newsletter (No 59 dated September 2022) is available on the ISRM website
Isrm Digital Library – Free Access
The ISRM Digital Library is hosted by the OnePetro platform (www.OnePetro.org). Individual members can download up to 100 papers per year from ISRM meetings; Corporate members can download 250 papers per year. To download the ISRM papers free of charge, ISRM members must perform a two-step registration on the OnePetro website:
- Register in the OnePetro website, using any username/password they choose. If the member has already registered at OnePetro, it is not necessary to register again.
- Enter their current ISRM username/password in the OnePetro Membership page.
The OnePetro site automatically checks the status of ISRM membership with ISRM.
Young Professionals’ Webinars
The ISRM Young Rock Engineers group have established the very successful ISRM Young Members Monthly Seminars. These provide an excellent opportunity for current postgraduate students, researchers and early career professionals to present their work. Anyone wishing to present at one of these events should contact Romy Ridl, our ISRM YGP coordinator.
Ten seminars have been held to date in 2022. The most recent presentations (27 October) were by Dr Jon Just Urratia (Spain) and Dr Jonathan Aubertin (Canada)
Paul Horrey
NZGS ISRM Liaison
Romy Ridl
NZGS ISRM YGP Coordinator