Geoprofessions

Geoprofessions is a term coined by the Geoprofessional Business Association to connote various technical disciplines that involve engineering, earth and environmental services applied to below-ground ("subsurface"), ground-surface, and ground-surface-connected conditions, structures, or formations. The principal disciplines include, as major categories: geomatics engineering geotechnical engineering; geology and engineering geology; geological engineering; geophysics; geophysical engineering; environmental science and environmental engineering; construction-materials engineering and testing; and other geoprofessional services. Each discipline involves specialties, many of which are recognized through professional designations that governments and societies or associations confer based upon a person's education, training, experience, and educational accomplishments. In the United States, engineers must be licensed in the state or territory where they practice engineering. Most states license geologists and several license environmental "site professionals." Several states license engineering geologists and recognize geotechnical engineering through a geotechnical-engineering titling act. Geotechnical engineering Although geotechnical engineering is applied for a variety of purposes, it is essential to foundation design. As such, geotechnical engineering is applicable to every existing or new structure on the planet; every building and every highway, bridge, tunnel, harbor, airport, water line, reservoir, or other public work. Commonly, the geotechnical-engineering service comprises a study of subsurface conditions using various sampling, in-situ testing, and/or other site-characterization techniques. The instrument of professional service in those cases typically is a report through which geotechnical engineers relate the information they have been retained to provide, typically: their findings; their opinions about subsurface materials and conditions; their judgment about how the subsurface materials and conditions assumed to exist probably will behave when subjected to loads or used as building material; and their preliminary recommendations for materials usage or appropriate foundation systems, the latter based on their knowledge of a structure's size, shape, weight, etc.