Ground investigation and Eurocode 7: A Scottish perspective

Introduction As everyone in the geotechnical community should already know, the foreword to EN 1997-2:2007 states: “This European standard shall be given the status of a national standard, either by publication of an identical text or by endorsement, at the latest by September 2007, and conflicting national standards shall be withdrawn at the latest by March 2010.” On the matter of soil and rock sampling and groundwater measurements, section 3.2(2)P of EN 1997-2:2007 states: “The requirements of EN ISO 22475-1 shall be followed.” Just over a year has passed since the above documents have become the accepted standards of the industry. To date, the experience of South Lanarkshire Council is that complying with the documents, in particular EN ISO 22475-1:2006, has been difficult, a view echoed by professional colleagues in both consultancy and contracting. This paper briefly outlines the difficulties experienced by South Lanarkshire Council in complying with Eurocode 7, by referring to relevant sections of EN 19971:2004, EN 1997-2:2007 and EN ISO 22475-1:2006, and proposes a way forward that seeks to comply with the philosophy of Eurocode 7.