The Earthquake Engineering Research Institute (EERI) is pleased to announce that Dr. Ken Elwood is the recipient of the 2022 Distinguished Lecture Award.
The annual Distinguished Lecture Award recognizes and encourages an EERI member for communication of outstanding professional contributions of major importance for earthquake hazard mitigation. Elwood’s Distinguished Lecture, “From Ductility to Repairability: Evolution of Building Design in the Wake of the Christchurch Earthquake,” will be presented at the 12th National Conference on Earthquake Engineering and EERI Annual Meeting in Salt Lake City in 2022.
Elwood received his PhD in Civil Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley in 2002, M.S. from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1995, and BASc from the University of British Columbia in 1993. Ken served on the EERI Board of Directors and as the Chair of the Learning from Earthquakes Committee. Always seeking to work at the boundary of research and engineering practice, he has served as a member of several international code committees and currently sits on the American Concrete Institute Building Code (ACI 318) Committee. He is actively involved in research related to the seismic performance of existing concrete buildings, repairability, and post-earthquake recovery.
Elwood joined the University of Auckland in July 2014 after 11 years on faculty at the University of British Columbia, Canada. After experiencing the Christchurch Earthquake first-hand, he was drawn to New Zealand to pursue the numerous opportunities for research and implementation in earthquake risk reduction in the wake of the earthquakes. He served as the inaugural Director of Te Hiranga Rū QuakeCoRE: Centre for Earthquake Resilience, a New Zealand Government-funded Centre of Research Excellence.
Elwood is excited to be starting a new phase in his career in November 2021 through a multi-year secondment to the New Zealand Government to serve as the MBIE/EQC Chief Engineer (Building Resilience). Through this role, he will champion the resilience of New Zealand’s built environment, by establishing strong stakeholder connections and promoting collaboration between relevant research, policy, and practice players.
For more information about the Distinguished Lecture Award, visit the EERI awards page.
