Shale Symposium at the International Congress of the ISRM Montreal, Canada May 10–13, 2015

Abstract

The Canadian Rock Mechanics Association (CARMA) and the American Rock Mechanics Association (ARMA) together with the leadership of the Congress under Professor Hassani organized a special ‘‘Shale Symposium’’ at the International Congress of the International Society for Rock Mechanics (ISRM). This symposium, which ran during four half days during the 3-day Congress, was structured in three topic areas with corresponding sessions: ‘‘Basics and Slopes’’, ‘‘Mining and Tunnels’’, ‘‘Hydrocarbon’’. An additional session was devoted to a debate on ‘‘Shale is a Soft Rock, not a Hard Soil’’. Each of the topic sessions started and ended with a keynote paper. The keynote papers were substantially revised, and the revised versions were peer reviewed for publication in this special issue following this editorial. A few comments about the topics covered in each session are provided here: In Basics and Slopes most of the papers dealt with basic mechanical and mineralogical properties of shales, and the majority of papers did so based on laboratory tests and field observations while a few concentrated on numerical modeling. Mining and Tunneling papers not only presented a variety of case studies but also some work on fundamental aspects that need to be considered. Not surprisingly many of the case studies relate to radioactive waste repositories. As to be expected the Hydrocarbon session was the one with the largest number of papers. There was a good mix of topics, ranging from simulation (modeling) to laboratory and field experiments, including several papers that combined modeling and experimentation. The papers are listed in the list of references at the end of this editorial. As indicated above, the Symposium also included the debate on the ‘‘motion’’ ‘‘Shale is a Soft Rock, not a Hard Soil’’. Debaters for the motion were Derek Elsworth and Priscilla Nelson; debating against were John McLennan and Maurice Dusseault. The debate started with a short formal argument by each debater, followed by informal replies by all debaters, questions from the audience to the debaters and an open discussion within the audience. It ended with a vote, which after an initial vote with equal numbers of votes for and against, ended with the nearly unanimous vote for Mark Zoback’s proposal. ‘‘Shale is both a soft rock and a hard soil’’. This is a very appropriate introduction to the Special Issue since it reflects both the basic properties of the material and the engineering consequences.