Headshot of Charles Shackelford

Charles D. Shackelford

Professor and Department Head, Civil and Environmental Engineering​

Charles D. Shackelford is Professor and Head of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado, USA. He has 40 years of experience pertaining to the geoenvironmental aspects of waste management and environmental remediation, is a registered professional Civil Engineer in California and Colorado, and has served as an expert on waste disposal issues on numerous occasions for private companies and federal agencies.

Between 2001 and 2006, he served as the Director of the Rocky Mountain Regional Hazardous Substance Research Center (HSRC) for EPA Region 8, one of five EPA sponsored HSRCs during that period covering the 10 EPA designated geographical regions comprising the U.S. Shackelford has given 125 invited presentations in the U.S., Puerto Rico, and 26 other countries. He has served as an Editor for both the ASCE Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering and the Journal of Hazardous Materials published by Elsevier, Amsterdam, and currently serves as an Editor for Elsevier’s Geotextiles and Geomembranes. He also was past chair of the Geoenvironmental Engineering Committee (GEC) of ASCE’s Geo-Institute, and past co-chair for the Environmental Geotechnics Committee TC215 of the International Society of Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering (ISSMGE), and currently is still a member of both the GEC and TC215. He also served as a member and the chair of ASCE Geo-Institute’s (GI’s) Awards Committee, as a member of the Technical Coordination Council of ASCE’s GI, and was an elected Board Member of the U. S. University Council on Geotechnical Education and Research (USUCGER). Shackelford was elected to the Academy of Civil Engineers at his alma mater, the Missouri University of Science and Technology, in 2005.

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Shackelford’s research is focused primarily on evaluating flow and transport of hazardous liquids and contaminants through soil and geosynthetic containment barriers, such as compacted clay liners and geosynthetic clay liners, commonly used in chemical containment applications (e.g., landfills, surface impoundments, lagoons, secondary containment of above-grade fuel storage tanks, etc.), as well as through soil-bentonite vertical cutoff walls used for in situ control and containment of polluted groundwater. His most significant contributions have related to characterizing diffusion of potential contaminants through and semipermeable membrane behavior of these barrier materials. The majority of his research has been funded by the National Science Foundation, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Department of Energy.

  • Environmental geotechnics
  • Geotechnical engineering for waste containment
  • Geoenvironmental engineering
  • Groundwater flow, seepage, and contaminant transport

Education

  • B.S. 1980, Missouri University of Science and Technology – Civil Engineering
  • M.S. 1983, University of Texas at Austin – Civil Engineering
  • Ph.D. 1988, University of Texas at Austin – Civil Engineering

Highlighted Honors and Awards

  • 2019: ASCE Life Member
  • 2019: CGS Cross Canada Lecture Tour
  • 2015: ASCE Fellow
  • 2013: ISSMGE R. Kerry Rowe Honorary Lecture for Environmental Geotechnics
  • 1995: ASCE Walter L. Huber Civil Engineering Research Prize
  • 1992: NSF National Young Investigator Award