Professor Guy Houlsby

Guy Houlsby was Professor of Civil Engineering at Oxford University 1991-2020, Head of the Department of Engineering Science 2009-2014, and is now Professor Emeritus. He is an expert in geotechnical engineering, where his main interest is in offshore foundations. Applications include structures for the oil and gas industry, but more particularly in recent years for offshore wind turbines. He also works in theoretical soil mechanics and plasticity theory, developing a rigorous thermodynamically-based approach to constitutive modelling. His current work brings together these two themes, developing models for cyclic loading of foundations for offshore wind turbines.

His research was supported by government funding and co-operation with industry, especially in the offshore sector. He regularly lectures in the UK and abroad, and in 2014 gave the prestigious Rankine Lecture on “Interactions in Offshore Foundation Design”, invited by the British Geotechnical Association. He acts as a consultant in civil, geotechnical and offshore engineering, including legal and arbitration cases.

His first degree and PhD are from Cambridge University. In 2003 he was awarded a DSc degree by Oxford University. He is a Fellow of the Institution of Civil Engineers and of the Royal Academy of Engineering.