SRI LANKA ENGINEERING NEWS - Wild Apricot SLEN... · The key item of the event was the induction of...

The Newspaper of The Institution of Engineers, Sri Lanka Vol. 50, No 05, September / October 2014Registered at the GPO as a Newspaper No. QD/48/News/2014

PRESIDENT’S CORNERPRESIDENT’S CORNERPRESIDENT’S CORNERPRESIDENT’S CORNERPRESIDENT’S CORNER

Established 1906

ENGINEERING NEWSSRI LANKA

108th Annual Sessions ofthe IESL inaugurated,

Eng. S. B. Wijekoon, The New President

The Institution of Engineers, Sri Lanka (IESL) held the inauguration of its 108thAnnual Sessions at the SBMEC Auditorium BMICH on Friday 10th October, 2014from 9.00 am onwards. Dr. P.B. Jayasundera, Secretary to the Ministry of Fi-nance and Planning was the Chief Guest while Eng. (Prof.) Mohan Munasinghe, FounderChairman of Munasinghe Institute of Development (MIND), Colombo was the Guest ofHonour for the event. A large gathering of distinguished invitees, Past Presidents andmembers of the IESL attended the event.

Eng. S B Wijekoon the being inducted as the new president for the 2014/2015session by Eng. Shavindranath Fernando president for 2013/2014 session

This is my very first message to thePresident’s Corner and I will brieflytell you the plans I had put forwardat the inaugural sessions on 10th Octo-ber 2014. Basically I am trying to make3 things, namely, the first one I havenamed as Service Excellence of the IESLSecretariat. The second one is ICT forProductivity Enhancement of IESL andthe next one is theIESL Outreach Drive.So for the first, what we are trying to do is to improve the perfor-mance of the IESL headquarters because there are various is-sues and criticisms from the members saying that the head-quarter is not resolving issues at the required speed and to thesatisfaction of the members. So therefore I am planning to ad-dress that issue during the coming year. The next one is, wehave introduced ICT in 2013 and we accordingly introduced aMembership Management System and now that it is workingvery well, we are trying to introduce more and more ICT to ac-tivities of the IESL to improve the performance in line with thefirst activity I have mentioned. The third one is, there are a largenumber of senior graduate engineers, who have not taken themembership of the IESL due to various reasons. Now there arevarious requests coming from them to get the membership andwe are now trying to study this problem and see whether wecan introduce some mechanism for these graduate engineersto become Corporate Members of the IESL and that I think will bean advantage for the IESL because the services of such memberscould be important to improve the performance and delivery ofIESL activities in the coming year.

Contd. on page 4...

FEISCA Regional Seminar addsinternational flavour to Inaugurationof 108th Annual Sessions of the IESL

Members of the Head Table at the FIESCA Seminar

The Institution of EngineersSri Lanka120/15, Wijerama Mawatha

Colombo 7, Sri Lanka

Tel: 2685490,2698426, 2699210Fax: 2699202E.mail:[email protected]/[email protected]:http://www.iesl..lk

in this issue

B D Rampala MemorialLecture.................................2Editorial..................................4Techno Sri Lanka 2014 - Awards CeremonyDazzles..................................6

The key item of the event was the induction of Eng. S.B.Wijekoon as the President of the IESL for the 2014 / 2015Sessions. Addressing the audience he laid out his plans forthe IESL for its 2014 / 2015 Sessions. The full text of thepresidential address follows:

"Ladies and Gentlemen, as you are aware the Institution ofEngineers, Sri Lanka which was established in 1906 is in-augurating its 108th Annual Sessions today. The Institutionwhich is the apex professional body for engineers in SriLanka has been incorporated by an Act of Parliament. It’sone of the oldest professional Institutions in South EastAsia and has about 15,000 members on its role at present.Today I am addressing you all as the President of theInstitution of Engineers, Sri Lanka for the sessions 2014 /2015, the highest position that an engineer can reach in hisprofessional career. I thank the membership for the trustand confidence placed on me by electing me to the presti-gious position. Reaching this level was never an easy taskand has been for me a long journey in my engineering ca-reer.

There are quite a few close associates of me who providedassistance, guidance and encouragement to me, perhapsbehind the stage, to enable me to reach this position todayand I am happy to mention the names of a few of them.First and foremost my own family members, my wifeSurekha and two sons Malinda and Maneesha. They are allhere today, they always managed their affairs in theirown,without burdening me, and left me to concentrate onmy official and institution related works. My mother andlate father guided me on the right path and taught me to dothings in a fair and reasonable manner with responsibility,and my gratitude goes to all of them.

I would like to mention my mathematics teacher, Mr. AsokaHerath, who is here today, who led me to the correct math-ematics track during my secondary education and it washis strict directions and guidance that laid the foundationfor me to excel in mathematics during my school days.

Contd. on page 11...

This year’s FIESCA Regional seminar held in Colombo sawheavy international participation. Held as part of the Inauguration of the 108th Annual Sessions of the IESL on Sat-urday, 11th October, 2014 at the Mihilaka Medura, BMICH, theseminar had “Innovative Technologies for Excellence in Engineer-ing” as its theme.It was organized by the IESL in association with the Federationof Engineering Institutions of South and Central Asia, FIESCA.President of the IESL Eng. Shavindranath Fernando deliveredthe Welcome Address. The Guest Speaker for the event was Dr.Brahmanand Mohanty who spoke on “Current Efforts to AchieveResource Efficiency through the next Wave of Innovation”.The Keynote Address on “Innovation in Engineering Education”was delivered by Prof. Robin King.The Technical Sessions that followed saw country presentationsbeing made from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal and SriLanka.

IESL NEWS2Sri Lanka Engineering News - September / October 2014

TENTATIVEANNUAL EVENTS

CALENDAR2014 / 2015

Event Dates♦IESL Event Launch Friday-February 13, 2015♦National Engineering March 2015 Conference

♦Engineers Night Saturday-March 14, 2015♦New Year Family Saturday-May 09, 2015 Get Together

♦Engineering Excellence Friday-August 14, 2015 Awards

♦Induction and Graduation Friday-August 28, 2015 Ceremony

♦Inauguration of the Friday-October 16, 2015Annual Sessions

♦Techno Exhibition Friday - Sunday, 09, 10, 11 October 2015

♦Annual Sessions Seminar Saturday- October 17, 2015

♦Annual Sessions Site Visit Sunday- October 18, 2015

♦Annual General Meeting Saturday- October 24, 2015

♦Techno Awards Friday- October 30, 2015 Ceremony

NEW ARRIVALS TO THELIBRARY

Title Author

Fire Protection for Commercial Bromann, MarrleFacilitiesEconomics – A Self Teaching Slavin, SteveGuideUser & Non-User Benefit AASHTOAnalysis for Highways(with CD Rom enclosed)Mechanistic Empirical Pavement AASHTODesign GuideA Policy ion Geometric Design of AASHTOHighways and Streets: 6th Ed.Power System Engineering Arora , C.M.Automatic Control System ( with Saeed, HasanMATLAB PROGRAMS)

THE INSTITUTION OF ENGINEERS, SRI LANKA

Registration of Structural EngineersDirectory of Structural Engineers

1. Registration as Structural Engineers

As per the requirements of the Urban Development Authority (UDA) it has become neces-sary for the Corporate Members in the field of Civil Engineering to register with the Institutionand those members are requested to get their names listed in the Directory of StructuralEngineers that the Institution publishes annually in order to be eligible to carry out structuraldesigns of buildings with more than 4 floors. Interested members are requested to apply forregistration using the application form No: DES-SE/FO/11 available at the IESL and whichcould also be downloaded from the IESL website at www.iesl.lk. The duly filled applicationform has to be accompanied by a brief CV of the applicant and an application processing feeof Rs. 2,000/=. The application would be processed only if the member has settled his/hersubscription fees up to and including the year 2015. The successful applicants will be re-quested to pay a fee of Rs. 1,500/- to get their names listed in the Directory of StructuralEngineers.

2. Directory of Structural EngineersCorporate Members who have registered themselves as Structural Engineers with the Insti-tution can now get their names listed in the Directory of Structural Engineers in order tobecome eligible to carry out the structural designs of buildings in their respective categoriesfor the year 2015 by applying using the application form NO: DES-SE/FO/12 available forcollection from the IESL Secretariat or downloadable from our website at www.iesl.lk. Theduly filled application form has to be accompanied by an application processing fee of Rs.1,500/=. The application would be processed only if the member has settled his/her sub-scription fees up to and including the year 2015.

3. SEAL

It will be mandatory for structural engineers to use the seal issued by the Institution, in theirofficial correspondence and in the certification of drawings. This seal can be obtained byusing the application form NO: DES-S/FO/10 available for collection from the IESL Secre-tariat or downloadable from our website at www.iesl.lk. The duly filled application form has tobe accompanied by an application processing fee of Rs. 2,000/=. An application once re-ceived would be processed only if the member has settled his/her subscription fees up toand including the year 2015.

All applications in respect of 1-3 above should reach the Institution onor before December 31, 2014.

EXECUTIVE SECRETARY

THE INSTITUTION OF ENGINEERS, SRI LANKA

Registration of Arbitrators andAdjudicators

Directory of Arbitrators and Adjudicators1.Registration as Arbitrators and / or AdjudicatorsCorporate Members of the Institution with more than 10 years of experience after becomingCorporate Members and who wish to register as Arbitrators and/or Adjudicators are requestedto apply for registration using the application form No: DES-AD/FO/1 in respect of Adjudica-tors and application form No: DES-AB/FO/2 in respect of Arbitrators. These forms are avail-able for collection at the IESL and that could also be downloaded from the IESL website atwww.iesl.lk. The duly filled application form has to be accompanied by a brief CV of theapplicant and an application processing fee of Rs. 2,000/= for registration as an Adjudicator oras an Arbitrator or as both. The application would be processed only if the member hassettled his/her subscription fees up to and including the year 2015. The successful appli-cants will be requested to pay a fee of Rs. 1,500/- to get their names listed in the Directory ofArbitrators/Adjudicators.

2.Directory of Arbitrators and Adjudicators

Corporate Members who have registered themselves as Arbitrators and/or Adjudicators withthe Institution can now get their names listed as Arbitrators or as Adjudicators or as both asthe case may be, in the 2015 Directory of Arbitrators and Adjudicators by applying for sameusing the application form NO: DES-AB/FO/3 available for collection from the IESL Secre-tariat or downloadable from our website at www.iesl.lk. The duly filled application form has tobe accompanied by an application processing fee of Rs. 1,500/=. The application would beprocessed only if the member has settled his/her subscription fees up to and including theyear 2015.

All applications in respect of 1-2 above should reach the Institution on or beforeDecember 31, 2014.

EXECUTIVE SECRETARY

NOTICE TO ENGINEERINGFACULTY UNDERGRADUATES

Be creative! Bring out the writer in you!Have an interesting story to tell? An idea to express? A ques-tion to ask, or a comment to make?Start writing now!The Editor of the Sri Lanka Engineering News (SLEN) news-letter of the IESL invites articles of technical, managerial,artistic or any other nature, even campus humour from you,our engineers-to-be.The editorial staff of the IESL is ready to support your initiativeand give it the best chance of success to be publishedin the SLEN.Write a true story of a project, a book review, a policy paper, apoem, or whatever you think will interest your clan.Send your draft materials (around 1500 words) to; The Editor,Sri Lanka Engineering News, E-mail: [email protected] can also post your draft article in the YOU ARE THE AU-THOR -WRITE TO SLEN blog in the institutionswebsite www.iesl.lk. For clarifications call Publicity Officer –IESL, Tel: 2698426 Ext 232.

Editor – ‘Sri Lanka Engineering News’

WRITE TO SLEN

IESL NEWS 3Sri Lanka Engineering News - September / October 2014

LATE ENG. B. D.RAMPALA

MEMORIALLECTURE

The B.D Rampala Memorial Lecture marking the 104thbirth anniversary of Bamunusinghearachchige DonRampala popularly called B.D. Rampala was held onFriday, 21st November, 2014 at the Wimalasurendra Audito-rium of the IESL. Eng. P.P. Wijesekera, former General Man-ager Sri Lanka Railways delivered the lecture on the theme ‘How to change Sri Lanka Railways to a profit making entity’.The IESL piously commemorates the birth anniversaries ofengineering greats the country has produced whose namesare etched in its rich engineering history. One such individualis B. D. Rampala who became the first native chief mechani-cal engineer in 1949, of the then Ceylon Government Rail-ways and went on to become the General Manager duringthe period 1955 - 1970, in what is now Sri Lanka Railways.The improvements he brought about to the country’s railwayare enjoyed by the people to this day.

Eng. S B Wijekoon, President of IESL garlanding theportrait of Late Eng. B D Rampala

Eng. P P Wijesekera, Resource Person, lighting thetraditional oil lamp

Eng. P P Wijesekera delivering the lecture

Eng. (Prof.) Thilakasiri Session Chairman receiving atoken of appreciation from Eng. (Prof.) K P P Pathirana,Editor- Transactions

Presentation of Technical Papersat IESL Annual Sessions 2014

The Presentation ofTechnical Papers forthe 108th AnnualSessions of the IESL con-ducted on Tuesday, 14thand Wednesday, 15th Oc-tober 2014 at theWimalasurendra Audito-rium of the institution , aspart of the inauguration ofits new sessions, was ahive of activity this year witha lot of authors and lay en-gineers mingling amongthe audience. As with theprevious years, the Call forPapers attracted largenumber of papers, underthe various disciplines.However, marked improve-ments were observed in thenumber of authors and at-tendees from the industryat the presentations, pos-sibly due to the wider andmore focused publicitygiven to the industry.

Section of the audience

ARE YOU READY? 2014The Career Guidance Unit of the University of Moratuwa in collaboration with RotaractClub of Univeristy of Moratuwa organizes the official careers fair of the university, ‘AreYou Ready?’, with the prime objective of bridging the gap between the soon-to-begraduates and the corporate sector. While improving the professionalism of theundergraduates and preparing them for recruitment in the industry, it also gives an opportunityfor the corporate sector to avail themselves of the talent that University of Moratuwa has tooffer.The first ever ‘Are You Ready?’ was held in 1998. It is worth mentioning that the superiorityof ‘Are You Ready?’ was recognized in the very first year itself. The event came underrecognition as the best professional development project in the Rotaract District of 3220 in

the same year, and hassecured the crown of theDistrict’s ProfessionalDevelopment citation for over10 years.In the course of its journey,‘Are You Ready?’ also cameto be assisted by the CareerGuidance Unit of theUniversity of Moratuwawhich helped to make theevent even more successful.With this development, ‘AreYou Ready?’ wasrecognized as the OfficialCareers Fair of theuniversity. Over the 15 yearsof its excellence, ‘Are YouReady?’ has showncommendable growth andhas now reached a pointwhere approximately 70companies and 700undergraduates take part init.The first session of ‘Are YouReady? 2014’, The Resume,

will commence on the 4th ofDecember, its objective beingto educate the participantson how to prepare a CV thatsets them apart from thecrowd. The sessions TheForum, YOUTM and TheExemplar will follow from the16th to the 18th of December,each of them addressingdifferent aspects of becominga successful professional.The highlight of ‘Are You

Ready?’, Flagship Day ,where employers form thecorporate sector meet thefinal year undergraduates ofthe universities to assesstheir abilities and recruitthem, will take place on the19th of December. ‘Are YouReady? 2014’ will concludewith its final session, DiningEtiquette and GroomingWorkshop, on the 27th ofDecember.

A forum that shared knowledge and experience


Sri LankaEngineering News

Dawn of anothersession after

Annual Sessions…

Thanks for the trust the engineers have upon me, I will becontinuing another term asthe editor. I requested in the previ-ous editorial to have more partici-pation by the members and we wit-nessed a remarkable progress inparticipation by the members in theIESL activities during the lastmonth.

The Members’ lounge at the Techno was for much of thetime, full of members and both the Techno and the AGMwere well attended by our members. More than that, par-ticipation in the annual session presentations was veryencouraging. Last year we observed that sometimes therewere less than 10 participants in some sessions, how-ever, this year it was around 80-100 throughout. Discus-sions too were very constructive and I feel that the youngengineers had an excellent time with a lot of advice. Thishas to be the “mentoring” that we all should expect fromthe senior engineers, rather than complaining that theyoung engineers do not perform well in the industry.

The way forward during this new session with the Presi-dent, Eng. S.B. Wijeyakoon has to be always positiveand members’ involvement must be even more. I humblyrequest the members to raise their voice and proposenew targets during the session.

I propose the following activities which were done duringlast few years to be continued; use of IT in communica-tion, conducting CPD courses to cater the needs of themembers, members’ reunion or members’ night, morefield visits organized by sectional committees (some wereeven foreign visits), more activities by regional chapters(SL and overseas), more CSR work such as building clinicetc.

I was requested by the Qatar Chapter to reserve somespace in the newsletter for “Gulf Column”. Of course, itwill be done and why not for others. Please propose aname for your column; it will be reserved for you. Valu-able articles and your activities will be definitely published.

Always remember that “IESL is ours” and do not criticizethat IESL is not moving in the right direction unless youactively contribute in IESL activities.

Eng. (Dr) Udeni P. [email protected]

The psychological factors thatconstrain human responses in

disaster risk reductionby Eng. Thushara Dissanayake

(M - 4943), Department of Irrigation

It was very recently we witnessed the sorrowful landslide disaster atMeeriyabedda in Koslandaarea. National Building Re-search Organization (NBRO)is the government institutiondealing with landslide haz-ards according to the disas-ter management act of SriLanka. According to theNBRO landslide hazard warn-ings had been issued severaltimes prior to the disaster onthis area. Apparently, peopleresiding at the location hadnot vacated the place despitesuch warnings. As usualheavy arguments went onamong many parties with re-gard to who should take theresponsibility of the disaster.Even at the moment of writ-ing this article investigationsare being carried out into tothe incident.

According to the United Na-tions International Strategy forDisaster Reduction (UNISDR)“disaster risk reduction is theconcept and practice of re-ducing disaster risks throughsystematic efforts to analyzeand reduce the causal factorsof disasters”. Accordingly re-ducing exposure to hazards,lessening vulnerability ofpeople and property, wisemanagement of land and theenvironment, and improvingpreparedness and early warn-ing for adverse events aresome basic actions of disas-ter risk reduction. Simplyspeaking disaster reductionis about choices. Each deci-sion and action makes thesociety either more vulner-able to disasters or more re-silient to them. The magni-tude of the impact dependson the nature of the choicespeople make.

Coming back to theMeeriyabedda disaster, infact, there can be two possi-bilities for the scenario. Onepossibility is that the authori-ties might have not taken nec-essary steps to shift thosepeople from the disasterprone area and resettle themin a safer place. Second pos-sibility is that people have notvacated the place irrespectiveof provision of safer lands andother requirements to re-settle. Whichever the casemight have been the questionis why people kept silent ne-glecting such warning of ahazard which has the poten-tial of making their lives to anend.

It is often mentioned thatmost people do not care aboutearly warnings, safety pre-cautions etc. The success ofdisaster risk reduction activi-ties largely depends on thecommunity participation.

Risks involve great deal ofuncertainties. Uncertainty isthe existence of more thanone possibility. As risks donot always bring about di-sasters, different people willperceive risk differently. Attimes people heavily objectstructural mitigation mea-sures like relocation. Therecan be various reasons forsuch type of public resis-tance during risk mitigationefforts. Lack of facilities atnew locations, high per-ceived value of their ownproperties, problems withregard to livelihood, separa-tion from relatives, politicalmisleading, and ignorancecan be some of the reasons.Similarly there can be somepsychological affiliations asthe root causes of such re-sistive behavior. They arediscussed under social psy-chology as psychologicaltraps or biases in decisionmaking and same could con-strain human responses indisaster risk reduction effortsas well. These psychologi-cal factors may affect notonly relocation endeavorsbut actually extend to abroader scope of risk reduc-tion practices. This article isabout implications of suchpsychological traps with di-saster risk reduction prac-tices.

Let’s look at some of thosepsychological traps that canhinder disaster mitigationefforts.

Status-quo

The preference for the cur-rent state of affairs is calledstatus-quo bias. An indi-vidual weighs the potentiallosses of switching from thestatus-quo more heavily thanthe potential gains. As such,potential risks are under-estimated and people refuseto shift from certain disas-ter prone areas they haveused to live in. Similarly,people are not willing to giveup practices that can in-crease the disaster risk. Un-willingness to adhere tosafety precautions in indus-trial activities, improper landuse practices for agricultureand other development ac-tivities, environmental pollu-tion especially by wrongfuldiscarding of solid and liq-uid waste can be given asexamples.

Over confidence

Over confidence effect is abias in which a person’s sub-jective confidence in his orher judgments is reliablygreater than the objectiveaccuracy of those judg-ments. This may help a per-son think that he is safe froma hazard. As a result, somepeople are reluctant to vacate

their residencies despite warn-ings of possible disasters.Some people say that they aresafeguarded by their religionas they are behaving virtuouslyaccording to their religion.Sometimes workers do notuse safety precautions and at-tribute it to their vocational ex-perience. Driving after con-suming alcohol, driving ex-tremely fast, risky overtaking,not wearing seat belts are be-haviors caused by overconfi-dence bias.

Conformity biasSometimes when people wantto decide what to do they lookaround and see what others doin this situation and imitatethem. This is known as theconformity bias. People fre-quently conform to the major-ity view, even when they knowit is definitely wrong. This be-havior can occur amongpeople during disaster mitiga-tion processes as well. Peoplealways do what the majority do.If the majority refrains fromleaving a risky area other indi-viduals also follow them de-spite their realization of risk.On the contrary, people panicunnecessarily during emer-gencies and create disastersby themselves like injuries orloss of lives due to congestion.

Gambler’s fallacyThe gambler’s fallacy is thebias where someone expectspast events to influence thefuture. For instance considerpeople living in an area whichhas got the risk of landslidesduring rainy seasons. Sup-pose there were no landslidesduring few consecutive rainyperiods. Then according to thegambler’s fallacy people in thatarea believe that there will beno more landslides and en-gage in activities without car-ing the risk and finally subjectto a disaster.

At present human psychologi-cal aspects are taken into con-sideration only during post di-saster phases like recovery.When a community-wide di-saster hits psychological treat-ments are done to restorethose who have mentally af-fected by the disaster. In fact,this type of psychological inter-vention is equally important fordisaster risk reduction. Evenfew educational programs onthis subject would benefit thepeople a lot. The success ofthe actions taken by authoritiesto reduce disaster risks willfurther improve if people areable to make correct decisionsdevoid of psychological bi-ases.

Reference:1. www.humancond.org2. www.mindtools.com3. www.psychwiki.com4. www.unisdr.org5. www.wikipedia.com

So in line with this we have already decided at the first Councilmeeting held on October 18, 2014 to set up 3 Task Forcesand we have appointed members to these Task Forces andI think they are going to work out their proposals on how wecan achieve these goals and then we will look at theseproposals and get the approval of the Council. I am planningto introduce these activities by 1st January, 2015 and then Iwill inform you the progress, may be during the comingmonths especially through the Digital SLEN as well as theSLEN and may be the website.

I kindly request all members to send your suggestions notonly for these 3 areas but also for any areas to improve theIESL activities and we will look at these suggestions posi-tively and see whether we can incorporate these things intothe activities and to improve the benefits for the members inthe following months. So thank you very much and wish youa very good day.

Contd. from page 1....

PRESIDENT’S CORNERPRESIDENT’S CORNERPRESIDENT’S CORNERPRESIDENT’S CORNERPRESIDENT’S CORNER


Commencement of the Meeting: at Head Table from left: Eng. ShanthaWeerasinghe Master of Ceremony, Eng. Kamil Ariff, Seccretary of

Srilankan Engineers’ Society Qatar(SLESQ), Eng. Tilakasiri Ekanayake -President, SLECQ, Mr. Jayantha Palipana, the Sri Lankan Ambassador

for Qatar, Eng. Shavindranath Fernado, President IESL, Eng. MChandrasekera, Guest Speaker

Office Bearers of IESL Qatar Chapter and SLSEQ with the PresidentIESL

President IESL handing over a Plaque to the very first President ofIESL Qatar Chapter

Responding to the demands of its globally dispersed membership the IESL has established overseas chapters in WesternAustralia, New Zealand and Qatar this year in quick succession. The chapter in Western Australia which was the second inthat country (It already has a chapter in New South Wales Australia established during 2009/2010 sessions) together withthat in New Zealand were established in June this year. The Qatar Chapter, the first in West Asia region, was established inSeptember this year. Eng. Shavindranath Fernando – President of IESL for the 2013 / 2014 sessions personally attended theinauguration ceremonies of all three new chapters.

IESL Extends Global Reach - Establishes new chap-ters in Western Australia, New Zealand and Qatar

The interim Committee ap-pointed to conduct the affairsof the Western Australia Chap-ter comprise of the followingoffice bearers; President:Remy Jayasekera, Secretary:Tissa Wijayasinghe, Trea-surer: NimalJayaratne, Com-mittee Members:Bandu laSamaras inghe ,ChirantheWeerawardena,Srinath Fernando,M i t h r a M u d i y a n s e l a g e ,DumalKannangara andSisiraSanda

The New Zealand Chapter hasappointed an Interim Commit-tee until a permanent commit-tee could be appointed to con-duct the affairs of the societywith following office bearers:President: Gregory ShahaneDe Costa, Secretary:Sirimevan Rangamuwa, Trea-surer: Madunishanthi K A,Vice President:SampathDissanayake, Com-mittee Members: Justin DeSilva,Renuka Anthony andDon Karunaratne.

The Qatar Chapter is the lat-est overseas chapter to be es-tablished by the IESL in Sep-tember this year and becomesthe first of its kind in SouthAsia region.

Delivering the Keynote ad-dress at the inauguration ofIESL Qatar chapter on 27thSeptember 2014 at MercureGrand Hotel in Doha, Qatar,President Eng. ShavnidranathFernando stated that he con-sidered the year 2014 as theyear of professional excel-lence and it was with greatpleasure that he was partici-pating at the inaugural meet-ing of the IESL Qatar chapter,during the same year. Hestated that all the Sri LankanEngineers working in MiddleEast region would benefit fromthis initiative as he believedthat it will act as a catalyst forthe forming of more IESL chap-ters in the region, particularlyin UAE, Bahrain and Oman innear future.

The Ambassador of Sri Lankain Qatar, Mr. JayanthaPalipana who attended as theChief Guest, in his address

stated that forming a chap-ter of IESL which is theapex organization of SriLankan Engineers, is a his-toric event. He requestedthe elected members to un-dertake the responsibility ofmaintaining and growingthe Chapter as a reputed or-ganization representing theEngineers who have comefrom Sri LankaPresident of the Sri LankaSociety of Sri Lankan En-gineers Qatar Eng.Tilakasiri Ekanayaka deliv-ering his welcome addressstated that formation ofIESL Qatar Chapter wasthe brainchild of the execu-tive committee of Sri LankaSociety of Engineers Qatar(SLSEQ) who successfullyliaised with the IESL mak-ing the Qatar Chapter a re-ality. This is the first IESLchapter formed in Gulf Re-gion and third IESL chap-ter established in overseas.

Guest speaker Eng. M.Chandrasekara spokeabout professional develop-ment paths for Engineers,particularly for those whoare working in Middle East.

Nearly 75 enthusiastic SriLankan Engineers workingin Qatar joined the event atwhich the following officebearers were unanimouslyappointed for the year2014/15. President: Eng.Rohana Egodagamage,Vice President: Eng.Chandralal Mendis, Secre-tary: Eng. Kamil Ariff, Edi-tor - Eng. TilakasiriEkanayaka,

Treasurer: Eng. JagathPerera, Committee Mem-bers : Eng. GeethanandaDe Silva, Eng. ChamathMuwangala, Eng. J. S.Dayananda, Eng. SamanKumara and Eng. Ajith DeSilva.

At the end of the proceed-ings, a fellowship and din-ner were hosted by theSociety of Sri Lankan En-gineers Qatar.

IESL Qatar Chapter inauguration photos


Techno Sri Lanka 2014 - Awards Ceremony Dazzles

The Techno Sri Lanka 2014 Awards Ceremony was heldin grand style with the participation of stallholders,sponsors, distinguished guests, Council members,Past Presidents, members of the organizing committee andstaff of the IESL Secretariat on Sunday, 2nd November, 2014at the Hotel Galadari, Colombo from 7.00 pm onwards.

Dr. Lawrence Perera – Chairman / CEO, Micro Holdings(Pvt) Ltd, graced the occasion as the Chief Guest while Eng.Shavindranath Fernando –IESL President for the 2013 / 2014session delivered the welcome address and Eng. S.B.Wijekoon proposed the Vote of Thanks. Winners of variousstallholder award categories, IESL Member Raffles andRobogames and Computer competitions received theirawards. Token of appreciations for the various sponsor cat-egories were also presented. In between presentation ofawards and speeches the audience was treated to superbentertainment and music. The event concluded with buffetdinner.

Dr. Lawrence Perera Chief Guest at Techno Sri Lanka 2014 awards addressingthe gathering.

Eng. Shavindranath Fernando, President, IESL session 2013/2014 pre-senting the award for Best Display of Engineering Services to Mr.Kennedy Joseph, Senior Vice President, Browns & Company PLC

Techno Sri Lanka 2014 raffle draw first prize winner Eng. N M SKalinga receiving his prize of return air ticket to Singapore(couple)

Dr. Lawrence Perera, Chief Guest presenting the Goldaward for Best Demonstrations to Mr. KunchanaJayaweera of Sri Lanka Telecom/Mobitel

Channa Upuli dancing Troup at the awardsceremony


Techno Sri Lanka 2014 held for the 29th year...Techno Sri Lanka 2014, the national engineering and technology exhibition organized by the IESL was successfully held at the Sirimavo BandaranaikeMemorial Exhibition Centre for the 29th consecutive year on 10th, 11th and 12th October, 2014 coinciding with the inauguration of the 108th AnnualSessions of the IESL. It was declared open by Hon. Wimal Weerawansa – Minister of Construction, Engineering Services, Housing and CommonAmenities. The exhibition which has built up a reputation as the best forum for showcasing cutting edge technology from around the world had more than260 stalls taken up by international trade giants and their local agents this year.

Sectional Committees of the IESL representing the differentdisciplines of engineering and IESL Centres from the provincesoperated stalls demonstrating engineering features unique tothem and of special interest to the public. Engineering Facul-ties of all state universities including the Open University of SriLanka and other institutions like the HNDE that offered engi-neering education operated stalls demonstrating technical acu-men of engineering undergraduates and students. .

Special features that have become unique to this exhibitionlike the Building Clinic which offers free advice to those en-gaged in building a house of their own and daily seminars ontopics of relevance to the public were ever so popular this timetoo.

Competitions organized by the Young Members Section likethe Sphagetti Bridge, Hackathon and Cad Eager competitionshad very enthusiastic participation from under graduates add-ing fun to the event.

Giving encouragement for creativity among the student gen-eration the top 20 inventions at the Junior Inventor of the Year(JIY) 2014 competition, conducted by the IESL for school chil-dren from schools all over the island were given the opportu-nity to exhibit their inventions at the event.

Book Launched

Techno Sri Lanka Exhibition Chief Guest, Hon. WimalWeerawansa, Minister of Construction, Engineering Services,Housing & Common Amenities lighting the oil lamp

Chief Guest and Eng. S B Wijekoon, President Elect, IESL visitthe exhibition stalls

Chief Guest at the Mobitel Stall

An autobiography ofProf. Rohan Lucastitled “A tongue – in –cheek Autobiographyof Prof. Dr. Eng. RohanLucas includingMemories of others"was launched onFriday 17th October2014 at theW i m a l a s u r e n d r aAuditorium.

A distinguished Fellow of the IESL and a Fellow ofthe Institution of Electrical Engineers (UK), Prof. Lucasalso has membership of the Computer Society of SriLanka, Sri Lanka Energy Managers Association andthe SLAAS. An academic par excellence with nearly40 years of postgraduate experience in teaching,research and professional practice, he has publishedover 60 papers in international and local journals andco-authored several text –books in ElectricalEngineering topics.The autobiography is available for sale at theIESL@ Rs. 560/-.

Structural Design InstituteProfessional Development Course on

“Advanced Concrete Technology and State of the Art Practices”On 19th December 2014

atThe Main Auditorium

ofThe Institute of Construction Training and Development (ICTAD)

From 08:30 a.m. onwardsRegistrationFee:

General:Rs. 7,500/=For Professionals: Associate Members or Corporate Members of IESL, SLIA, IQSLRs. 5,000/-

For Students: University Undergraduates, IESL studentsRs. 750/-

Registration fee will cover attendance for all lecture sessions, tea & refreshments, lunch, a set ofcourse notes and acertificate of participation.

Key Notes

High Performance ConcreteProf. Priyan Mendis, University of Melbourne, Australia.

Design of Structural Members with High Strength ConcreteProf. Priyan Mendis, University of Melbourne, Australia.

State of the Art Concrete TechnologyMr. Ravi Nissanka, Managing Director, Millennium Concrete Technologies (Pvt) Ltd.

Concrete in Practice – Applications and ChallengesEng. Shiromal Fernando, Managing Director, Civil & Structural Engineering Consultants (Pvt) Ltd.

For Registration Contact:Tharaka – 0777 666 803,Haadi - 077 106 76 06

E-mail: [email protected] Details for Payments:

Bank: Commercial Bank, Ward PlaceAccount Name: Structural Design Institute, Account Number:1145013032

Note: Kindly note that the registration will be on first come first serve basis due to limitednumber of places available.


RE-INTRODUCTION OF RUBBLE AS A BASE COURSEMATERIAL & ITS APPROPRIATENESS FOR THE RURAL

ROAD CONSTRUCTION (PROGRAMME), IN PARTICULAR by: Eng. S.D.S. Deshapriya - RDA

ABC is a widely usedroad material for theconstruction of roadbases.It has become morepopular due to its easiness forhandling. How ever it showsthat comparatively largestones such as rubble (9")can be used very effectivelyfor the construction of roadbases. Accordingly the rubbleis proposed here forconstructing the road basestogether with ABC only asthe filling material for coveringthe interstitial voids there in.In the technical aspect, itgives more bearing capacitythan ABC material.Since it is big in particle size,more area involves, hence itcan withstand more load &transfer more load to theground with less settlement.As a result of this, rubblelayer characterizes higherB.C. value.Since rubble is big in particalsize, more egergy can beabsorbed before crushing.Hence it is a big advantageto achieve more strongerbases by using rubble thanABC material.Other point is the less costinvolved. It is cheaper materialthan ABC & mainly due tothis reason the constructioncost is reduced remarkably.Hence the rubble bases willbe very attractive forconstructing roads. Morestronger base at a lesser costis the main significance therein.Even though, rubble has beenused in traditional Mecadomconstruction earlier, it isstressed here that thisproposal is different to it , dueto involving well gradedaggregate in place ofuniformly graded aggregateswhich is used in Mecadomconstruction. Hence thefailures which hadexperienced in traditionalmethod due to unfilled voids,lack of compaction, lack ofcompatibility & consistencyin particle size etc. is avoidedhere by introduction of wellgraded ABC (GABC).After facing problems asabove, with Mecadomconstruction, authorities havechanged straight away to thepresent ( well graded) ABCmethod. In thecircumstances. This proposallies, in mid way betweentraditional Macadum method& present ( well graded) ABClaying operation in order toeconomize the constructionwork. Accordingly the amplesavings involved in thismethod can be imaginedmerely by assuming that thepresent (well graded) ABClayer is replaced as much as

possible by rubbles (9")which is cheaper in themarket.In the light of thegovernment's rapid rural roadimprovement programme,benefit of the above proposalwill be much hilighted. Basestrengthening has also beenseen incorporated there in asa measure of strengthening &upgrading rural roads. In theprocess of above roadp r o g r a m m e , f i n a n c i a ldificulties which faced by thegovernment could be reducedconsiderably by introducingrubble laying in place of(well)graded ABC to the ruralroads. In addition to thisrubble laying which followedby a cheaper surfacing on topwill further reduce the cost.Finally, being able toconstruct more road lengthat a lesser cost , will be themain point of attraction. It willbe a direct benefit to thevillagers & rural folk to have agood road net work. Lengthof road section which has tobe cut off now due to thelimited funding could beavoided completely by thismethod & many villages inremote areas could be ableto link within the availablebudget. It will be a big boostto their lively hood as far asthe rural falk is concerned.In addition to the above effect,some more advantages arealso involved in this proposal,from the public point of view.One is that it will give aopportunity to have a veryintensive public participationfrom the village level.In a situation where thequality rock is not availablein the village ABC material willhave to be transported at ahigher cost. In stead of itnearby rock in the villagecould be used for supplyingRubble, since it requires onlyless quality parameterscompared to GABC. This willbe further justified due to theless traffic volume & lessspeed in general which isexperienced in rural roads,compared to the nationalroads. Responding to thissituation, many availablerocks could be used for thisrural roads uplift ingprogramme very effectively. Itcan be organized as a villagecentered labour intensiveprogramme to supply rubblefrom the village itself.Since the main role is playedby the Rubble here, fillingmaterial will not be muchimportant as far as the qualityis concerned. Hence it is anadded advantage that thequality of the filling also canbe varied through a largerange without affecting to the

final quality of base layer.Accordingly the variousfilling materials which areavailable in the village canfurther be considered,including insitu soil gravel,weathered rock pieces etc.under the technicalguidance. Accordinglypeople will be benifited intwo ways by participatingin this construction &earning the wages inaddition to processing agood road for their village.In addition to the wide publicparticipation, being able touse the available machinefleet for this operation is theencouraging factor therein.Base Construction can bestarted by laying rubble onthe existing road orcompacted sub grade. Inorder to assure the uniformlaying, simple contral barcan be fixed to the dumptruck. It will be followed bya Front end bucketed truckso that the ABC can be laidon rubble layer to cover allundulations & to make thesurface smooth enough totravel along. Finally thecompaction is achieved byusing the vibratory rollerswhile adding any extra ABCmaterial as required for asmooth finish. Due to theeffect of vibration, will pushrubble to the final stableposition & orientation whichsourrounded by the wellcompacted ABC particles.

Suitability to vil lageconditions is another pointconsidered when usingrubble.Most of the village roads arenot wide enough,hencesubjected to erosions &most roads pass throughpaddy fields which goesunder water frequently. Insuch a situation, comparedto ABC, rubble stands wellahead by withstandingagainst erosion, inundation& wash away. Specially theroad built on rubble basesince it provides a havingfoundation, will be passableeven after subjecting to aflood till it repairs where asthe no signs of road remainsafter a flood which built onABC base. In such asituation road with ABCbase will be a completereconstruction using heavybudget but the remainingstrong rubble base after theflood needs only a overlayon it. Accordingly the lesssecondary cost is verysignificant in rubble baseas far as the life cycle costis concerned. Hence manyof public grevences forrestoring the roads after

floods & delaying repairwork due to lack of fundscan be minimized & beattended at a low budget.Easier to handle duringrainy season is anotherfactor towards positivedirection. Mostly theprepared sub base surfacebecome muddy during therainy period & laying &compaction of ABC on itwill not be practical. If thework is also urgent, in sucha situation constructionusing Rubble would be easydue to the fact that biggerstones will not be buried(embedded completely) intomud fully, hence theconstruction can becontinued smoothly.Further the rubble whichembedded so, will causeto improve the sub-gradecondition as well againstsettlements in sub grade.(There in the rubble will actas a strengthening measureto the underneath weaksoil.) This has to beconsidered in a situation ofa high bearing capacity(BC) which processedgenerally by the rubble baseresulting to impose moreresistance againstsettlement.Hence the cumulative effectof above two will worksuccessfully againstsettlement.Hence rubble base will wellanswer to the settlementswhich occur frequently inroad sections near by paddyfields in rural roads. Withthe less maintenancebudget also will be able tosurvive the roads inpassable condition for yearsof which built on rubblebase.This will cause the Rubblelaying to promote, as tobe the lasting solution ingeneral, for the settlementsof which observed alongroads.However the benefit of usingrubble bases is not limitedto the rural roads. It can bewidely use for Nationalroads as well. Ultimately,country will be processinga very strong rubblebase(foundation) all over ata lesser capital cost toreceive any overlay infuture. When the base isstrong,it is a secondarydecision to be taken for theoverlay, either for DBST, ACetc. It will avoid futuresettlements & the need forreconstructions from thebottom.Theoretically a rubble basecourse needs lesscompaction since it transfer

loads mainly by means ofinterlocking. Other factorwhich attributed for lesscompaction is only the fillingmaterial of ABC requirescompaction where as Rubbledenies .Hence it would be veryeffective in areas where thecompaction is difficult toachieve.Since it will withstand againstwashing away & errosion,even during constructionstage exposed ruble layer willwithstand against any suchadverse situation. Further therubble bases has shown longlasting & satisfactoryperformance in hilly rerrainsthan with ABC material. Hencerecommended for theseareas.As far as the large volumewhich acquired by the rubble(being the main constituent)is concerned,energy requiredfor crushing to ABC particles& compacting again intodense form as in the presentpractice is completelyeliminated due to theintervention of these stoneshere. Hence with energysaving point of view, use ofrubble as an alternativemethod is an environmentalfriendly solution.When more thickness isrequired depending on the siteconditions, then rubble wouldbe more economical & morestronger due to the loaddistribution improvessignificantly.Instead of 9" rubble, evenwhen the road is constructedusing material billow 9" size(say 4"-6") also ‘will increaseB.C. due to the particle sizeis still larger than ABC.Henceparticle size 4"-6" etc. alsocan be applied very effectively.In such a situation, even thelayer thickness lesser than200mm. also can be appliedfor satisfactory performance ofbase course so that theimproved B.C. willcompensate for lesser layerthicknesses.

As stated earlier,it is an addedadvantage to relax the qualityof filling material in presenceof rubble. Accorgingly, whenusing rubble, filling materialcan be varied through a largerange without affecting to thefinal quality of base course.Reintroduction of rubble as abase course material is themain concern in this article.

However in addition to this,filling materials are also tobe searched for in a largerange here as an extension tothe above exercise.Accordingly various fillingmaterials are proposed hereincluding insitu soil, gravel,Contaminated ABC, ABCmixed soil or with excessivefines weathered rock silty clayetc. for further researching.


Manmade Disasters and the Way Outby Eng. M. Chandrasekera (F 649)

Most of the people whoare living today (otherthan those in the de-veloped countries and those inthe middle and upper classesin other countries) have beenborn not because of their wishor because their parentswanted them. They have beenborn as byproducts of the natu-ral biological process calledsexual reproduction. Nature has a Program bywhich a male and a female(once they attain teen age) aredrawn towards each other withthe end result of bodily satis-faction to one or both of themwhile implanting of an embryoin the body of the female(which will eventually becomean element in the next genera-tion).Unfortunately when the naturedraws a male or femalehomosapien towards eachother, it does not choose part-ners who are physically andpsychologically fit at the timeof their coitus to produce ahealthy offspring. As such,children are born to physicallyfit parents as well as to thosewho are unfit to produce chil-dren (due to hereditary as wellas lifestyle impairments).Also the present day’s childrenwho are born to wealthy andmiddle class parents becomesick (afflicted by juvenile dia-betes, obesity, hypertension,visual impairment etc.) at verytender ages thanks to their non– healthy eating habits andsedentary life styles planted inthem (and their parents) by theliberalized mass media.However, in accordance withhuman rights that we value,and thanks to the superior de-velopments in the fields ofmedicine, advance communi-cation facilities and the disas-ter management facilities, weare able to physically andmedically save many lives ofwhom are those subjected todisease and disasters. Theend result is the explosion ofpopulation and also the rapidincrease of the number of de-pendant persons (socially andeconomically inactive persons)who are to be supported byother persons (active persons).Just imagine what would havehappened if all the coituses thathappen day and night endedup with new fetuses? Wewould not have had even stand-ing space on the earth sur-face!!!As we know, out of the earth'ssurface, the habitable portionis only about 10 %. In SriLanka, out of the total landextent, homesteads accountfor about 800,000 ha out of thetotal of 6,650, 000 ha. This isabout 12 % of the gross area.According to 2013 census, SriLanka population was 20.43million. Hence, per capitahomestead extent is about

0.04 ha (i.e. about 400sqmper capita). Prior to advent ofthe industrial era in the 1900,the population has been about4, million and in the year1950, it had been 7.7 millionand per capita homesteadextents had respectively been0.2 and 0.1 ha approximately.Thanks to pipe borne water,grid electricity, advanced roadnetworks, modern communi-cation systems etc. manymarginal lands that were prac-tically uninhabitable half acentury before, have becomehabitable by and by. Hence,due to shortage or nonaffordability of habitable land,the successive generationswho became landless weremoving into lands that havebeen lately made habitable byhuman intervention.Nobody cared for this harmfulprocess, by taking the naturefor granted.Although the nature has si-lently bared such interven-tions, it is wrong to take forgranted that the humans havewon over the nature. Naturehas its own ways and meansof retaliating with vengeance,by way of creating calamities,some of which are foresee-able and the others are not so.In that sense, it can be seenthat even during good old days(prior to advent of industrialera), the nature has had waysand means of keeping menand animal populations undercheck and balances by appro-priate intervention.See the examples of disas-ters listed in the Table givenbelow. In it, Category A di-sasters are those that couldbe treated as naturally oc-curring. Some of those aretime immemorial ones. Abouthalf of them come without anyprior warning and the restcome with short warnings.Occurrence of most of themcannot be prevented. Very of-ten, the short term Mitigatorymeasures are limited toevacuation and giving medicalassistance to those affectedin the immediate aftermath.Longer term solution is therelocation of vulnerable com-munities.In the given Table, CategoryB disasters are fully or par-tially manmade. Of them, thefirst three (that are causeddue to burning of fossil fuels)are the most widespread anddevastating.As medium term measures toalleviate the harms that befalldue to Category B disasters,stop gap ‘adaptation’ mea-sures are being implemented.For example, in the field of ag-riculture, the customarilyused longer term paddy vari-eties for Maha cultivations arebeing substituted with shorterterm varieties. In the field of

air conditioning, CFCgases are being replacedwith HFC gases; but(while they are good sub-stitutes from Ozone pro-tection aspect), theyhave been lately classi-fied as green housegases which are 4000times worse than CO2due to their ability to sur-vive in the atmospherefor about 50years!!!The principal evil today isthe ever increasing en-ergy demand by the manfor maintaining the latelyadopted extravagant lifestyles (which was not soin the pre – industrializa-tion era). It is correctthat the quality and du-rability of human life hasvastly improved by theindustrial products thathave become part andparcel of contemporarylife of the man. Neverthe-less, their production aswell as use requires en-ergy. Per capita annualenergy consumption inthe world in year 1990has been 30 gigajoules.In the year 2000 it hasbeen 80 gigajoules ofwhich 65% has comefrom fossil fuels(oil, coaland natural gas). In the Economists’ jar-gon, the production ofeconomic goods and ser-vices yields ‘economicgrowth’ brought about bythe ‘value addition’ ap-plied to factors of produc-tion: land, labor, capitaland entrepreneurship.They may call it ‘growth’but alongside this growth,the population too keepson increasing. As we allknow, the ‘resources -meaning the ‘factors ofproduction’ are limitedwhereas the humanneeds are unlimited.The net outcome is dogfight by too many peopleto make as much of theresources as possiblefor their own benefit. Theresult is the going downof ‘per capita share of re-sources’.Do not forget that everyitem of industrial productcomes with a quantity of‘waste’. Very often, thosewho make products donot take responsibility of‘safe disposal’ of thewaste generated bythem. It thus becomes apublic responsibility.Hence, ‘the per capitawaste quantity’ tookeeps on increasing withthe increase of the prod-ucts. Good examples arethe garbage dumps atB l o o m e n d a l ,

Meethotamulla andKaradiyana etc.As there is no socialism anylonger in the world, naturallythe ‘haves’ exercise a biggercommand of the resources.They also generate the lion’sshare of waste. The ‘have-nots’ who have little or nocommand of the resourcesare forced to take care of thedisproportionate quantum ofwaste generated by the‘haves’.It has been found that the rich20% in the world consume80% of the goods and ser-vices produced at any giventime today. The burden ofenergy generation for theirproduction/use and disposalof associated waste is largelyborne by the 80% poor. Themost harmful out of all wastesaccording to today’s findingsis CO2, the scale of its harmon the society is measuredby the indicator called ‘car-bon foot print’ which is re-lated to the tonnage of CO2released to atmosphere byhuman activity. In accordancewith this indicator, the biggestoffenders are countries suchas USA, Europe, Australia,China and India. The firstthree are economic giantsand the last two are emerg-ing economic giants.Even if we look at most of theremaining items of CategoryB disasters given in the Table(except those relevant to par-ticular localities such asEbola infection, wild elephantattacks), the situation is simi-lar.This is the stark reality of thepresent day’s world order.Today it is customary to makeeconomic forecasts/plans forperiods of 5 years, 10 yearsor for a maximum of 20 years.But nobody can predict (or allof us are clueless) of whatwill happen possibly in an-other 50 or 100 years due tomany uncertainties the man-kind has to face with today;unfortunately all of which aredue to their own sins. Worldpopulation in year 1950 hasbeen 2.5 billion, in year 2000it has been 6.3 million. By2050 it is projected to hit 9billion.No agronomist, engineer, sci-entist or doctor, can say howthese people could be pro-vided with at least their basichuman needs in the form of:water, food, shelter, clothingand medical needs etc. ofsuch a large population.It is as if the whole world ispushing itself towards an ir-reversible catastrophe. The ir-reversible processes that wefollow today will result in ex-haustion of all basic re-sources available in theworld, having been used upfor making the goods and

services for the present gen-eration (at the expense of thegenerations to born).As Engineers we know howfast the water sources fromwhich we are obtaining drink-ing water is depleting; how fastthe sources of basic raw ma-terials such as steel, earth,rock we need for constructionare depleting. Agronomistsknow very well that they arerunning short of arable land togrow food needed for the grow-ing population. Doctors arebattling with more and morediseases inflicted upon thegrowing populations. In myopinion one basic mistake wemake in providing for theneeds of the present daypopulation is the adoption ofirreversible processes. By thisprocess, we get products aswell as loads of waste. Mostof the products too will be-come waste after being usedfor some time. The end resultsare piles of waste.

The only way out appears tobe to revert to cyclic or revers-ible processes in carrying outhuman activities. If that pro-cess is followed almost all thewastes can be turned over to‘resources’ again and again.Consider simple examplessuch plastic, glass, metalproducts etc. that we use dayto day which end up in gar-bage dumps. The pipe bornewater we let go after washing,bathing etc. to the publicsewer, to road drain or to openground. All these can be madereusable by subjecting themto appropriate recycling pro-cesses. We habitually wastemany ‘resources’ day in andday out due to our ignoranceor sometimes to our pride.It is my opinion that all thoseliving today (considering thegenerations to be born tomor-row), must adopt the followingmeasures if they really wishto avoid a total annihilation ofmankind from the earth in thenear future.Each country shall appoint athink tank consisting of quali-fied, trustworthy persons;

1. To recommend mea-sures to be adopted to switchover to ‘cyclic’ or ‘sustainable’production/consumption pro-cesses with a view of turningover the wastes to resources.

2. To recommend costeffective and efficient mea-sures to be adopted to cap-ture/store as much solar en-ergy as practicable to meet alenergy needs of the humans.

3. Recommend theways and means for humanbeings to adjust theirlifestyles to live with solar en

Contd. on page 10....


Contd. from page 9... Manmade Disasters.....Mitiigatory measuresPreventive measuresPredictabilityConsequence/sCategoryNo. Disaster type

1. Cyclones A Loss of life, properties,Crops

only short notice ispossible

none Loss of life and movableassets could beminimized by timelyevacuation

2. Droughts A Loss of life, crops Time of onset/duration/severity, not predictable

none Provide emergencyassistance: food andwater to those affected

3. Floods A Loss of life, properties,crops


Creation of storages anddetentions

Loss of life and movableassets could beminimized by timelyevacuation

4. Landslides A , B Loss of life, properties advance warningpossible

prevent human activitiesin vulnerable lands

Loss of life and movableassets could beminimized by timelyevacuation

5. Volcanic eruptions A Loss of life, properties advance warningpossible

none Loss of life and movableassets could beminimized by timelyevacuation

6. Earthquakes A Loss of life, properties Time of onset/duration/severity, not predictable

none Evacuation, medicaltreatment of the affected.

7. Tsunami A Loss of life, properties Time of onset, duration,severity, not predictable.Short warning possible

none Loss of life and movableassets could bereduced by timelyevacuation

8. Lightening A Loss of life, properties only short notice ispossible

none Follow therecommendedprecautionary measure

9. Pestilence (air borne pestsWeevils, beetles)

A Loss of crops, pain,disease to those bitten

Time of onset/duration/severity, not predictable

none Controlled by biologicalor chemical methods

10. Pestilence ( tree borne pests:Caterpillars)

A Loss of crops Time of onset/duration/severity, not predictable

none Controlled by biologicalor chemical methods,Cut/burn the affectedvegetation

11. Vector borne epidemics:Malaria, Dengue, encephalitis

A Physical deformity,mental depravity, death


Controlled by biologicalor chemical methods

Destroy habitableplaces, give medicationto affected

12. Viral diseases: air borne(swine flu ,chicken pox, SARS,small pox, rubella, measles

A Physical deformity,mental depravity, death

Time of onset/duration/severity, not predictable

vaccination,immunization

Take precautions incontacting with thoseaffected.

1. Increase of CO2 in theatmosphere

B Increase in ambienttemperature, melting ofpolar glaciers andHimalayan ice caps, sealevel rise, Loss ofhabitable land, marineresources

advance warningpossible

Reduction of fossil fuelburning

none

2. Contamination of atmospherewith acidic gases: SOX, NOX

B Loss of forest, reductionof crop yields



none

3. Particulate emissions toatmosphere

B Increase in respiratorydiseases, allergies



none

4. Release of CFC gases toionosphere

B Depletion of ozone layer,reduction in the ability ofshielding the earthsurface from harmfulcosmic radiation, causeskin cancer


Do away with the use ofCFC gases in industrialproducts.e.g.: air conditioners

none

5. Chemical/biological pollution ofwater bodies

Disease, physicaldeformity, mentaldepravity, death


Control of causativehuman activity

Avoid consumption ofpolluted water

6. Biological and Chemicalattacks

B Loss of life, waterbodies, crops

Time of onset/duration /severity, not predictable

none Avoid the consumption ofaffected water, cropsTake medication asneeded

7. Deforestation B Water table depletion,reduction of sinks forexcess CO2. Rise inambient temperatures,melting of glaciers,sealevel rise


none Reforestation in asustainable manner

8. Eutrophication (water bodiesbecomes rich in dissolvednutrients from fertilizers orsewage)

B encourage the growthand decomposition ofoxygen, depleting plantlife resulting in harm toother aquatic organisms


noneControl of fertilizer/agrochemicalapplications

9. Radioactivity leakages B Cause cancer, physicaldeformity, mentaldepravity, death

advance warning may ormay not be possible

noneavoid contamination byadopting precautions

10. Cyber attacks B Loss of stored data,information,malfunctioning of webbased services,computer networks

Time of onset/durationseverity,not predictable

Back up the valuabledata in remote storages

Incorporate protectiveand notification softwareinto computer systems /networks

Contd. on page 11...


ergy alone (assuming that the sun will be kind enough to keep on pumping its energy in the foreseeable future, and by realizing that it is the only‘sustainable energy donor’ to all earth beings).4. To determine the population each country could support in terms of the resources available in the country and to recommend the measures to attainthat population goal and maintain it.5. To recommend ways and means to prevent the accumulation of disproportionate wealth among a few people and to prevent them making use ofdisproportionate use of natural resources (in other words, too much of goods and services) for their living.Thereafter, the governing politicians of the respective countries must implement the recommendations of the above think tanks in a time bound manner. Afuture generation,, if and when they master the nuclear fusion technology (hopefully in another 50 – 100 years), could re-consider switching to a more energyconsuming lifestyle. Till then, the generations need to act with adequate restraints..

I am happy to see him in theaudience today to witness myinduction as the new Presi-dent of the institution and Ithank you sir for your pres-ence here today and all yourguidance and advice in thepast.Late Engineer E F M Pererawho was a retired Director ofHighways and a Fellow of theInstitution and Late EngineerJ B DIssanayaka, formerDeputy Director Bridges, alsoa Fellow of the Institutionencouraged and guided meto specialize in bridge con-struction and designs. LateEngineer K H.S.Gunathileke,former Chairman of StateDevelopment and Construc-tion Corporation, a Fellow ofthe Institution and EngineerM B S Fernando formerChairman of the Road Con-struction and DevelopmentCompany also guided me todevelop my professional ca-reer, specially on the lines ofgood governance. I cherishthe guidance I received fromLate EngineerSanathRanatunga, formerDean of the Faculty of Engi-neering of the University ofPeradeniya for encouragingme and guiding me to be anacademic. I value so muchall these advice I receivedfrom them.

One other important personI would like to mention hereis the senior engineer whopushed me to participate inthe activities of the Institu-tion of Engineers, Sir Lankaand it was his persuasion thatfinally made me join theCouncil of the Institution in1989 as a Representative ofMembers. Ladies andGentlemen he is engineerPalithaManamperi, a dy-namic personality and a veryexperienced bridge engineer.I thank you sir for your pres-ence here specially for com-ing all the way from Sydneyjust to witness my induction

as the president. Your guid-ance and encouragementhave paved the way for meto stand up here today as thepresident of the Institution ofEngineers, Sri Lanka for thecoming session.

Let me now talk about theachievements of the IESL.The Institution has been ad-mitted as a signatory to theWashington Accord and thishas made us the only bodyauthorized to accredit engi-neering educationprogrammes conducted inSri Lanka and these degreeprogrammes that are so ac-credited by the IESL will berecognized by all otherWashington Accord signato-ries. Also the IESL mem-bers have been given duerecognition as qualified per-sons along with the other pro-fessionals in the recentlypassed Act on ConstructionIndustry Development. Alsothe president of the IESL hasbeen made appointment asa member in the NationalAdvisory Council on Con-struction. Furthermore, afterfew years of deliberationsthe IESL has been able toconvince the decision mak-ers about the importance ofestablishing the Sri LankaEngineering Council andhopefully the related Act willbe passed in the comingmonths. Through theseachievements the IESL hasbeen elevated to stand at ahigher level among its sisterInstitutions and industry,both here and abroad, andalso among the public. As aresult, all the stakeholdersand members expect a veryhigh level of performance,better or improved serviceand enhanced benefits fromthe IESL. Therefore it is ourresponsibility to develop ourstrategies to deliver theseexpectations in the comingyear as well as in the future.In order to deliver the expec-tations we need to have agood mechanism within theIESL, in other words a dy-

namic and systematicmechanism should be es-tablished in the IESLHeadquarters. The Institu-tion has been running in thepast based on the publicsector model for its admin-istration and financial mat-ters and we have noticedduring the last few yearsthat the speed of thismodel is inadequate to de-liver the expectations ofthe members and thestakeholders and speciallyat a time when the expec-tations of the membersare very high. We have toexpedite decision makingand improve the quality andstandard of all our activi-ties in the future if we areto remain as a profes-sional and world class in-stitution.

Therefore Ladies andGentlemen, I am propos-ing 3 main activities to beimplemented during my ten-ure as president of theIESL for the 2014/2015session. Firstly, to developand implement a hybridmodel for IESL for speedyadministration and financialmatters with adequatetransparency, including theimprovement of the effi-ciency and effectivenessof the staff. Staff will begiven the authority to ex-ecute all activities with re-sponsibility and account-ability. Secondly I proposeto develop a high level ICTsystem to takeover thecurrent administration andother activities of the IESL.It is very important to havea very effective informationmanagement system andspeedy information flow toimprove the activities inthe IESL. During the ses-sion 2012/2013 a member-ship management systemwas introduced under theleadership of Eng. Tilak deSilva, Past President whois here with us today at thehead table, which has nowrun for 18 months without

any difficulty and I am sure themajority of the members now re-alize the importance, useful-ness and effectiveness of thesystem. I am proposing to fur-ther enhance the informationand technology system for theactivities of the IESL by givingmore powers to the ICT com-mittee to act with responsibilityand accountability.

Ladies and Gentlemen my3rdobjective would be tostrengthen and increase themembership by providing morefacilities and benefits to mem-bers, especially for those livingin the provinces and overseasand encouraging engineers withthe necessary qualifications andexperiences who have still notjoined IESL, to do so. I too amresiding in a province and when-ever I contested the elections Ireceived a large number ofvotes from members in theprovinces. Therefore I believeit is my responsibility to providebetter facilities and more ben-efits to them without diluting anyfacilities given to members inthe Western Province. Accord-ing to the IESL records approxi-mately 45 percent of its mem-bership, other than studentmembers, is stationed in theprovinces and in line with this Iam proposing inter-chapter ac-tivities to promote interactionamong members. I am alsoplanning to provide further as-sistance for their buildingprojects and for improvementsof the ICT facilities, includingvideo conferring facilities, andfor decentralizing some of theactivities presently carried outat the headquarters to a few se-lected chapters on a pilot ba-sis and depending on its suc-cess to extend the decentrali-zation to other chapters as well.Ladies and Gentlemen there arestill large numbers of engineersin the industry as well as theacademic field who are yet tojoin IESL and we urgently needtheir expertise to increase thelevel of service provided by theIESL. With recent achieve-ments and developments in theIESL their enthusiasm has in-creased and they want to be-

come members. I am plan-ning to address this issuewithout diluting the stan-dards and the quality of themembership.All these activities will beimplemented on project ba-sis as proposed in the IESLCorporate Plan that has al-ready been approved givingclear Guidance, Terms ofReference and TimeFrames. One year being avery short time I don’t wantto announce more than 3 ac-tivities, however, all the otheractivities that have been al-ready started by my prede-cessors at the IESL will becontinued without interrup-tions. I just took over thebaton from Eng.Shavindranath Fernando andnow it will be my responsi-bility to run as quickly aspossible to win the race withsupport from all of you.

I am happy to announce thatthe general membership haselected the Council for thesession 2014/2015 with adynamic enthusiastic andcommitted group of mem-bers and I am pretty sure thatthey will extend me their full-est support to implement theideas presented today aswell as other activities with-out any hindrance. I also re-quest the fullest corporationand support from all classesof members as well as fromCouncil members, pastpresidents and IESL staffmembers and all otherstakeholders to me duringthis coming session so thattogether we can bring theinstitution to the highest pos-sible level and provide ourservices to the members andto the general public in avery professional mannermeeting their expectations.My request to our membersis to allocate at least 4 hoursof your time in a week forIESL activities to make thisobjective a reality and the In-stitution a better place for allof us. Thank you for your pa-tient listening. Wish you avery good day."

Contd. from page 1....

Contd. from page 10..

108th Annual Sessions...

Manmade Disasters.....Mitiigatory measuresPreventive measuresPredictabilityConsequence/sCategoryNo. Disaster type

11. Life style viral diseases - bodyfluid borne

B Diseases such as AIDS,Ebola, Hydrophobia


Avoid contact, adjustlifestyle

none

12. Garbage dumps B contamination of waterbodies with leachate,release of objectionableodor, infestation ofdisease carrying flies,mosquitoes


Safe disposal ofgarbage

none

13. Growth of invasive, poisonousplant species

B Loss of crops, usefulvegetations, pollution ofwater bodies


Control harmful spreads Destroy physically/chemically of harmful plants

14. Increase of Kidney failures B Consumption ofchemically polluted water


Awareness campaignsand making available ofsafe potable water

none

15. Insect attacks (beetles, wasps) B Allergic reactions, pain,death

advance warning notpossible

Avoid disturbing thenests. Wear safety attire

medication

16. Wild animal attacks(e.g.: elephants)

B Loss of life, property,crops, plantations

only short warning ispossible

Relocation of harmfulanimals, Erection ofrepellent fences

Create conducivehabitats and adequatefodder enclaves toanimals


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