Hamid Moradkhani, Civil and Environmental Engineering faculty, provided three presentations at the European Geophysical Union's General Assembly in Vienna, Austria, April 13-18.

Hamid Moradkhani, Civil and Environmental Engineering faculty, co-organized a congress technical track titled "Stochastic and Probabilistic Approaches for Analyzing Complex Water Resources Systems" that included 12 technical sessions. He also presented three papers, "Uncertainty Assessment of Water Resources Systems using Data Assimilation and Ensemble Methods," "Toward Improved Hydrologic Prediction with Reduced Uncertainty using Sequential Multi-Model Combination," and "Lessons from Fish Passage Waterways in Oregon and Factors for Improving their Construction" at the World Environmental & Water Resources Congress 2008 in Honolulu, May 12-16. The last paper was co-authored with Sheryle Quinn and Trevor Smith from PSU. At the congress, Moradkhani was elected chair of technical committee on "Probabilistic Approaches in Water Resources Systems" through 2010.

Franz Rad, Civil and Environmental Engineering faculty, presented the paper "Behavior of Grouted Conduit Connections Under Cyclic Loading" at the Annual Convention of the American Concrete Institute in Los Angeles, March 30-April 3. The paper was co-authored by student Mike Pyszka.

Trevor Smith, Civil and Environmental Engineering faculty, was awarded a two-year, $240,000 grant from the Oregon Department of Transportation research program for Phase II of his calibration of Load Resistance Factor Design for Bridges. This research will improve the cost-effectiveness and design reliability of bridges founded on driven pile foundations.

Miguel Figliozzi, Civil and Environmental Engineering faculty, presented "An Analysis of the Efficiency of Urban Commercial Vehicle Tours" at the Winter 2008 Transportation Seminar Series in Portland, Feb. 1.

Christopher Monsere, Civil and Environmental Engineering faculty, co-presented a paper, "Safety Effects of Reducing Highway Illumination for Energy Conservation," at the Transportation Research Board's 87th Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C., Jan. 13-17. Monsere also co-authored four other peer-reviewed papers presented at the conference.

Miguel Figliozzi, Civil and Environmental Engineering faculty, presented three reviewed papers, "Planning Approximations to Average Length of Vehicle Routing Problems with Varying Customer Demand and Routing Constraints," "The Impacts of Congestion on Commercial Vehicle Tours Characteristics," and "Commercial Vehicle Tour Data Collection Using Passive GPS Technology: Issues and Potential Applications," at the 87th Annual Meeting of the Transportation Research Board in Washington, D.C., Jan. 13. The papers appear in the conference proceedings.

Wendelin Mueller, Civil and Environmental Engineering faculty, received an $85,877 research contract from the Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) to develop a methodology for the design of dampers to protect high voltage sub-station equipment from damage in an earthquake. This is a continuation of Mueller's work in this area on the study of the strength of steel members subjected to rapid loads. A full-scale verification test will be done using the seismic shake table in the infra-Structure Testing and Applied Research laboratory located in Science Building 2 before the dampers are installed in the field.