Rock Physics and Natural Hazards

Book excerpt: Natural hazards events such as earthquakes or volcanic eruptions involve activation of coupled thermo-hydro-chemo-mechanical processes in rocks. The present book assembles unpublished contributions to the 7th Euro-Conference on Rock Physics and Geomechanics, held in 2007 in Erice, Italy. It presents new laboratory data, theoretical and numerical rock physics models and field observations relevant to the study of natural hazards. In particular, several papers are devoted to rock failure and explore the relationship between the competing deformation micro-mechanisms. Several others investigate shear-induced anisotropy of mechanical and/or transport properties, both in large-scale geologic objects and in laboratory samples. The remaining papers treat various aspects of rock physics and their industrial applications such as geothermics and reservoir characterization.