Bioengineering Meets Geotechnical Engineering: An Approach to Sustainable Soil Stabilization.

Soil erosion is a dynamic process that engineers and scientists are just beginning to understand how to control. Many of the popular traditional geotechnical engineering techniques that used structural approaches for stabilizing soil are based upon research performed centuries ago.  However, soil bioengineering techniques are rooted in natural processes by using vegetation as a stabilizing treatment and these methods have been used successfully around the world for centuries.  Today, many soil bioengineering techniques are not incorporated into mainstream geotechnical engineering design due to the difficulties in analyzing them mathematically and the inherent intricacies of nature’s approach to stabilizing soil in the natural environments. This paper presents simple engineering concepts that are typically used to analyze earthen structures and recent revelations into vegetation’s impact on the basic structural characteristics of soil. Finally, this paper will cite examples of methods for incorporating vegetation as an effective and predictive engineering tool to enhance the design of earthen structures. Current research by the United States Army Corps of Engineers and academic circles is investigating the positive and negative consequences of using vegetation to stabilize critically important structures. With ongoing widespread acceptance of soil bioengineering as an effective alternative for stabilizing soil, we are optimistic that bioengineering techniques can be integrated into traditional geotechnical engineering approaches thereby providing designers options to control and stabilize the earthen environment while maintaining a sustainable focus.