TRI announces equipment acquisitions

Texas firm purchases former Bathurst Clarabut resources

Austin, Texas-based TRI Environmental Inc. (TRI), international geotechnical, geosynthetics, and erosion-control materials services company, announced in a May 31 press release the acquisition of advanced testing equipment from the former Bathurst Clarabut Geotechnical Testing (BCGT) office in Kingston, Ontario, Canada.

The equipment has been added to testing and research infrastructure supporting TRI’s geosynthetic interaction and geotechnical laboratory under the direction of John M. Allen, P.E., and Mike Domingo, one of the BCGT office’s original technicians, according to the release.

Added testing capabilities include:

• a specialized large-scale testing apparatus for analyzing the connection strength of segmental retaining wall blocks, such as those commonly found in highway retaining wall projects.
• a large-scale shear box—one of a few of its kind in the world—that will enable new analysis of shear strengths of waste and, thereby, supporting stability studies critical in mining and bioreactor landfill applications, the release said.

“These are exceptional apparatuses,” said TRI’s Allen. “The 3ft × 3ft large-scale direct shear box can actually be transported directly to a site, such as a landfill, for not just site-specific testing accuracy but site-specific understanding of conditions.”

The release noted that TRI now has the ability to conduct bench-scale bearing capacity studies for geosynthetics used in soil improvement applications. A loading device (5ft × 5ft) was part of the acquisition and will enable the testing of bearing capacity with materials such as geocellular systems.

In addition to retaining Domingo in Kingston, Pete Clarabut is currently acting as a consultant to TRI, the release said.

For more information: www.geosynthetictesting.com or John Allen at +1 512 705 5657, jallen@tri-env.com.