6. Geology applied to civil engineering. Issues and methods

Geology as a science naturally applies to civil engineering: it's easy to understand that a good knowledge of the subsoil is necessary for the successful construction of structures and infrastructures installed on or, a fortiori, in this subsoil.

The geologist's role is to determine and predict the nature and condition of the ground involved in the construction of a structure. To this end, he or she must identify and characterize the different types of terrain, and understand as best he or she can their distribution in the subsoil, in order to propose a geologically coherent representation. As the geologist only has access to partial and/or indirect observations of the subsoil, this representation is necessarily interpretative, and as such constitutes a geological model. The quality and reliability of this model will depend on the number and quality of the observation...