Research progress on safety risk management for large scale geotechnical engineering construction in China

Geotechnical engineering in China including urban rail transit, highway, high-speed rail construction, hydraulic engineering is featured by large scale, long construction period, complex operation and frustrating situations regarding project safety. Various accidents have been reported from time to time, resulting in serious social impact and huge economic loss. This paper presents the main progress in the safety risk management of geotechnical engineering in China from 2010 to 2017, including (1) national major scientific and technological projects, achievement awards, specifications for safety risk management; (2) safety risk analysis and evaluation method of large geotechnical engineering; (3) safety risk monitoring and early warning of large-scale geotechnical engineering construction; (4) information technology and platform of construction safety risk management of large geotechnical engineering; (5) the intelligent analysis and control of construction safety of large geotechnical engineering. Based on the analysis of the above research progress in China, new challenges in the safety risk management for geotechnical engineering are identified as follows: (1) application and promotion of quantitative risk assessment theory and technology; (2) risk decision theory; (3) the implementation of the whole-process safety risk management plan; (4) shared platform for the construction of safety accidents in geotechnical engineering; (5) analysis and control of geotechnical engineering parameters based on big data mining technology; (6) research and construction of intelligent geotechnical engineering.