scope:

EN 1997 is intended to be used in conjunction with EN 1990:2002, which establishes the principles and requirements for safety and serviceability, describes the basis of design and verification and gives guidelines for related aspects of structural reliability. EN 1997 is intended to be applied to the geotechnical aspects of the design of buildings and civil engineering works. It is subdivided into various separate parts (see 1.1.2). EN 1997 is concerned with the requirements for strength, stability, serviceability and durability of structures. Other requirements, e.g. concerning thermal or sound insulation, are not considered. Numerical values of actions on buildings and civil engineering works to be taken into account in design are provided in EN 1991 for the various types of construction. Actions imposed by the ground, such as earth pressures, shall be calculated according to the rules of EN 1997. Separate European Standards are intended to be used to treat matters of execution and workmanship. They are denoted in the relevant sections. In EN 1997 execution is covered to the extent that is necessary to conform to the assumptions of the design rules. EN 1997 does not cover the special requirements of seismic design. EN 1998 provides additional rules for geotechnical seismic design, which complete or adapt the rules of this standard. EN 1997-2 is intended to be used in conjunction with EN 1997-1 and provides rules supplementary to EN 1997-1 related to: planning and reporting of ground investigations; general requirements for a number of commonly used laboratory and field tests; interpretation and evaluation of test results; derivation of values of geotechnical parameters and coefficients. In addition, examples of the application of field test results to design are given. This document gives no specific provisions for environmental ground investigations. Only commonly used geotechnical laboratory and field tests are covered in this standard. These were selected on the basis of their importance in geotechnical practice, availability in commercial geotechnical laboratories and existence of an accepted testing procedure in Europe. The laboratory tests on soils are mainly applicable to saturated soils. The provisions of this standard apply primarily to projects of geotechnical category 2, as defined in 2.1 of EN 1997-1:2004. The ground investigation requirements for category 1 projects are normally limited as the verifications often will be based on local experience. For geotechnical category 3 projects, the amount of investigations required will normally be at least the same as indicated for geotechnical category 2 projects in the following sections. Additional investigations and more advanced tests, related to the circumstances that place a project in geotechnical category 3, may be necessary. The derivation of parameter values is dedicated primarily to the design of pile and spread foundations based on field testing, as detailed in Annexes D, E, F and G of EN 1997-1:2004.