This review is provided to outline the professional engineer qualifications, the accreditation systems working overseas, and their correlations as well as to introduce the international activities to acknowledge the substantial equivalency of the professional engineer qualifications and accreditation systems. In 1999, the Japan Accreditation Board for Engineering Education (JABEE) was established as a nongovernmental organization that examines and accredits engineering education programs conducted by higher educational institutions such as universities. JABEE is working in close collaboration with engineering associations, societies, and industry to ensure the international equivalency of the accreditation system for engineering education programs and contribute the progressive reform of engineering educations and raising social standing of professional engineers.
We also described
· Requests and expectations for improvements in engineering education programs from the mining / mineral / petroleum / environmental engineers in Japan
· Changes and reforms of the mining / mineral / petroleum / environmental engineering programs in Japan
· "Resources and Geological Engineering, and the Related Programs" area in JABEE, which has been organized to accredit the engineering education programs for geological, mining / mineral / petroleum, and environmental engineers in Japan
· Significance of the accreditation system operated by JABEE and its effects on engineering education paradigms, qualification system of professional engineers, and roles of engineering societies in Japan
· Key points for the accreditation and examination by JABEE, which are valuable and helpful for examiners and educational programs

View full abstract

A constitutive equation of variable compliance type has been proposed by Okubo et al. in 1987. The equation is simple and its parameters are relatively easy to obtain. The equation can be applicable to an extensive range of loading conditions including creep, however, experimental result in primary creep region in which strain rate is decreasing with time does not conform well to the calculated result.
Okubo & Fukui proposed a constitutive equation especially focusing on low stress level creep and primary creep region. Recently, old one proposed in 1987 and new one were combined to extend an applicable range, and calculated results were compared with the experimental data of creep for validation of the proposed constitutive equation.
In this study, the constitutive equation proposed by Okubo et al. is tested against results of uniaxial compression and tension tests. It can be said that experimental results of uniaxial compression tests including the loading rate dependency of compressive strength can be well simulated by the proposed equation. The equation is also tested against the results of uniaxial tension tests and possible applicability of the equation to tensile stress field is discussed.

View full abstract

Stability monitoring of rock slope covered with limestone is an important for safety operation of limestone open cut mine in Japan. In this paper, a series of field measurements has been carried out in a limestone open cut mine and deformation behavior of rock slope with cover rock has been discussed. Results obtained in the present study are summarized as follows.
1) The ground penetrating radar prospecting was applied to detect the geological boundary between cover rock and base rock, and it is confirmed that the ground penetrating radar is useful to visualize the geometry of the geological boundary as well as the damaged zone in rock mass.
2) The relative displacement measurements have been carried out in two rock slopes, one is a homogeneous type and the other is a cover rock type, by use of the multi-channel-extensometer. From these results, it is clarified that deformation behavior of the slope with cover rock differs remarkably from that of the homogeneous slope, and that the cover rock moved downward along the geological boundary. Furthermore, it is pointed out that the stability of cover rock may be affected by the existence of damaged zone.
3) The vertical seismic prospecting was applied to evaluate the damaged zone. Comparing the profiles of P-wave velocity with the displacement distributions obtained by the multi-channel-extensometer, it is confirmed that the seismic prospecting is effective to evaluate the damage of rock.

View full abstract

Fine waste concrete smaller than 5mm obtained from a recycling plant of waste concrete was used as feed and ground by a wet attrition mill. Recovery of the fine aggregate and cement hydrate powder from the ground fine waste concrete was investigated using a laboratory / pilot scale Mozley multi-gravity separator (MGS). The water absorption of the fine aggregate obtained as the high specific gravity product was less than 3.5 % and the dry density was larger than 2.4 g/cm³. The powder obtained as low specific gravity product contained about 29 % of fine aggregate. The reference for normal clinker and the mixture prepared by mixing the reference materials with 38 wt% of the powder were heated at 1,500 °C, with the hydraulic modulus adjusted to 2.18, the silica modulus to 2.8, and the iron modulus to 1.64. The phases of the clinker were identified and quantitatively determined by a microscopic point-count procedure and by the Rietveld analysis using XRD data. There was good agreement in the clinker minerals of the reference and the mixture clinkers. These results show that the fine aggregate and cement hydrate powder recovered from fine waste concrete by MGS can be recycled in cement and concrete production.

View full abstract

Recovery of heavy metal ions from their low concentrated water is developed using the activity of sulfate-reducing bacteria immobilized on a fibrous slag (FS), which was employed as both bio-carrier and particle collector medium. An up-flow type bioreactor was composed of FS packed column, where sulfate-reducing bacteria (SRB) was immobilized at a lower part. In this process, sulfate ion (SO₄^2-) in the liquid is biologically converted to hydrogen sulfide (H₂S), which reacts with metal ionic species to produce ultrafine metal sulfide particles. Subsequently, formed particles are collected onto the FS surface in the upper part of the reactor, thereby accumulating heavy metals ions as their sulfides precipitates. In the continuous treatment of water contaminated with 6 mg / l of cadmium, almost complete removal was carried out throughout the operating period, approximately 30 days. Cadmium sulfide precipitates gradually accumulated on the FS bed, and finally total amount of cadmium sulfide recovered reached 27.3 mg per unit gram of FS. The experimental result indicated that the proposed bioreactor, Sulfate-Reducing Bioreactor with Fibrous Slag carrier (SRB-FS), served as an efficient heavy metal recovery column with the aid of SRB.

View full abstract

Removal behavior of Pb, Ni from liquid copper by Cu₂O-Fe₂O₃ based slag with one or two additive oxides among CaO, B₂O₃, SiO₂, P₂O5 and TiO₂ was investigated in the temperature range from 1,200 to 1,300 °C. The results obtained are as follows,
1) The Pb removal was largely increased by the addition of acidic oxide, but the Ni removal was at most 50 % for all slag compositions investigated.
2) The addition of P₂O₅ and TiO₂ was obtained nearly same good results as the addition of B₂O₃. Thus, P₂O₅ and TiO₂ was found to be practically used as a substitute for B₂O₃.
3) The Ni removal was enhanced by increasing temperature, which could be explained to the decrease of activity coefficient of NiO. However, The Pb removal was retarded by increasing temperature.
4) The kinetic behavior of Pb and Ni removal by oxidizing slags could be well simulated by the reaction model based on the two film theory.

View full abstract

To evaluate the degradation of gelatin and polyethylene glycol (PEG) added to the electrolyte for Cu electrorefining, the time-dependence of the cathode potential was measured during long-term electrolysis. Gelatin and PEG acted as a polarizer for Cu deposition to shift the cathode potential to less noble direction. The polarization caused by the additives gradually disappeared with an increase in the electrolysis duration. The effective duration of additives increased with an increase in the molecular weight and was longer in PEG-containing solution than in gelatin-containing solution. The longer effectiveness of PEG may be attributed to its stability in the solution. The degree of polarization by the additives was decreased with time even when the additive-containing solutions were left un-electrolyzed. The effective duration of additives was slightly shorter in the solutions electrolyzed continuously than in the solution left un-electrolyzed. On the other hand, the morphology and the crystal orientation of Cu obtained by long-term electrolysis were in good agreement with the cathode potential change with time regardless of the kinds of additives. With an increase in the polarization of cathode potential , the deposits showed the smooth surface composed of fine grains and decreased the preferred orientation. The deposits showed the same morphology as that in the additive-free solution when the polarization was decreased by the degradation of additives.

View full abstract

The effect of regents concentrations for recovery and shape of precipitate on the liquid-phase synthesis of precursor particles of Y₂O₃ : Eu phosphor was studied. The amount of precipitant generated by hydrolysis of urea was remarkably changed by reaction temperature and initial concentration of urea. Therefore, the reaction rate of the precipitation reaction was controlled by reaction temperature and initial urea concentration. The recovery of precipitate was increased from < 10% to > 99% with the increase in urea concentration from 10 × 10^-3 to 30 × 10^-2 mol/dm³ in the synthesis at 92°C for 1 hour, when initial concentration of rare-earth ion was 10 mmol/dm³. On the other hand, the particle size was decreased with increase in urea concentration. The shape of particles was changed from uniform sphere to irregular aggregate with increase in initial concentration of rare-earth ion under the lower urea concentration condition. However, mono-dispersed spherical particles were formed even in that case, when the ratio of rare earth for the urea was higher. Though non-aggregated particles were amorphous basic carbonate; (Y, Eu)OHCO₃, the carbonate was crystallized in the aggregated particles. By the calcination at above about 600°C, both compositions converted to the oxide; (Y, Eu)₂O₃, but original shapes of precipitate particles were retained after that. Therefore, mono-dispersed spherical Y₂O₃ : Eu phosphor particles could be obtained from morphologically identical precursors. These results indicate the range of initial reagents concentrations in which mono-dispersed spherical Y₂O₃ : Eu phosphor is prepared.

View full abstract

The molecular structure of pore water in the montmorillonite-water system is studied by means of the Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy. In the near-infrared region, absorption bands observed at around 5,088 cm^-1 (very broad) and 5,245 cm^-1 (relatively sharp) are attributed to combination tone of bending and vibrational mode of water molecule (H₂O) in the intelamellar space of montmorillonite, while the 4,518 cm^-1 peak is due to combination tone of structural hydroxyls at the octahedral layers. These facts indicate that the water molecule at the interlamellar space is in the two different vibrational states depending on the hydrogen bonding. The former band at around 5,088 cm^-1 is related to the hydrogen bonding between water molecules, while the latter band at 5,245cm^-1 is to that between montmorillonite-water interface. Although, considering their frequencies, the hydrogen bonding between the montmorillonite-water interface is weaker than that between water molecules, the activation energy of self-diffusion of water at the water-montmorillonite interface is higher than the bulk water. This discrepancy seems to be due to the preferred orientation of water molecule in the neighborhood of the montmorillonite surface.

View full abstract

In this study, we have studied on the non linearity of hydraulic conductivity for Neogene sedimentary rocks under low hydraulic gradient. The behavior was tested not only by laboratory test but also in situ test taking account for accuracy under low hydralic condition. It's found that the non-Darcy is dominant in the hydraulic gradient less than 5 at the laboratory test. Also at the in situ test the non-Darcy behavior was found. We proposed the model of the flow under low hydraulic gradient using capillary model taking account of Bingham flow. This model is based on the assumption that the molecule of water is absorbed by the surface of micro condition. It was found that the non-Darcy behavior was well simulated when all capillary have a narrow (10^-8m) space.

View full abstract

In this paper, the authors present the results of experimental studies of air-water two-phase flow and discuss the characteristic shape of relative permeability for a single fracture.
In the experiments, the authors prepared three transparent epoxy replicas of natural rock fractures and both water and air were injected into them to generate two-phase flow conditions. Pressures at the inlet and outlet, flow rates of both phases were measured, and the saturation was obtained by image processing of the digital photo.
A set of relative permeability curves for air-water system in a single fracture was proposed. The curves show that the water phase becomes immovable at relatively high water saturation while the relative permeability of air phase becomes rapidly high with a decrease in water saturation.
The proposed set of relative permeability curves might be useful for the quantitative interpretation of a two-phase flow through a fractured medium.

View full abstract

TEMCO's MP-401 (mini-permeameter) is a gas permeameter that is capable of making direct and immediate measurements of rock permeability at the outcrop. The equipment was used to measure deformation bands arising along small displacement faults within an aeolian sandstone. The bands appear as cataclastic fragments that have a reduced porosity. The results demonstrated that the permeability of the deformation bands was an order of magnitude less than in host sandstone.
The mini-permeameter provides a ready and direct measure of the permeabilities of any rocks or sediments, although it has been found desirable to check field values by alternative means to ascertain the limitations. Therefore, the values measured at the outcrop were compared with the permeabilities determined for the same samples in the laboratory using other techniques. Although Darcy's equations provide an excellent model of the permeability of intact porous sedimentary rocks, they are limited in their application to cases such as fault rocks, fractured rocks, and highly impermeable rocks. Not only are the fluid pathways in such materials narrow but they may also be convoluted. The results confirmed the outcrop measurements and established the limitations of the gas permeameter.

View full abstract