In Memoriam: Professor Geoffrey Walton
Geoff Walton – a stalwart of EIG Conferences – sadly passed away in February 2025 at the ripe old age of 85. He will be remembered by many as a serious and passionate, but also good-humoured and well-respected applied geologist. He was also known to be rather irascible on occasions and politically incorrect from time to time.
Geoff was a Chartered Engineer and a Fellow of what is now the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining (IOM3). He gained his PhD in mining engineering from the University of Nottingham and worked initially as a geotechnical engineer in the Opencast Executive of the National Coal Board. Around this time he was also seconded to the Rock Mechanics Research Group at the RSM (Royal School of Mines), before establishing the Geoffrey Walton Practice (GWP) as an independent consultancy firm in 1973.
Through GWP he became a pioneering force in the practical application of geology and geotechnical engineering in the UK extractive industries. His approach to consultancy was always to apply scientific solutions to geotechnical problems and to integrate such advice with new technology and innovative research. He forged collaborative links between industry and academia and, for a period of twenty years from 1995, was a visiting professor of mining at Leeds University. Such links provided opportunities, not only for consultancy work, but also to set up spinoff research activities, such as Dustscan (which became a limited company in 2004), and to encourage new geologists and engineers to move into the industry.
After attending and presenting papers at previous EIG conferences, Geoff joined the EIG organising committee in 2002 and acted as Chairman for the 2004 conference at Leeds. He also edited or co-edited the proceedings from that and the next three conferences (Edinburgh, Cardiff and Portsmouth). In 2008, following the Cardiff conference - at which he suffered a major heart attack - Geoff was the inspiration behind setting-up Extractive Industry Conferences Limited as a not-for-profit company, limited by guarantee. This reflected not only his enthusiasm for promoting EIG as a professional organisation for industry-focused geologists but also his passion for the company to become financially sound and rigorously managed.
During his time with EIG he gradually ‘evolved’ from being a thoroughbred geotechnical engineer, who didn’t believe that landscape architects and ecologists could help to design quarry restoration schemes, to someone who accepted that the ‘bugs and bunnies’ and ‘herbs and veg’ (his usual terms for biodiversity), may be important after all.
In 2010, Geoff was invited to present the Ansel Dunham Memorial Lecture at the EIG conference in Portsmouth. His chosen subject, on ‘Consulting geologists and the British extractive industries’ was a reflective one, reviewing UK trends in the direct employment of geologists within the industry and the associated rise in the use of independent consultants. At that conference he also received an EIG award for distinguished professional services to the extractive industries.
In 2007, Geoff left his original consultancy firm to set up Professor Geoffrey Walton & Associates, (PGW&A LLP), where he continued as a Director until 2013, by which time Dustscan was taking up most of his time. He nevertheless continued his involvement with EIG and, from 2013 onwards he initiated and ran – often single-handedly – a series of very successful one-day ‘technical’ EIG meetings in between the main biennial conferences.
Over the last two decades, as Geoff gradually eased himself out of consultancy work altogether, his attention turned largely to his long-held interests in the History of Geology (he was a former vice-chair of the Geological Society’s History of Geology Group) and in publishing. In 2021 he set up Down Stone Books and published a largely autobiographical work on ‘The Early History of an Applied Geoscience Consultancy: Setting up GWP’. This covered the gestation, birth and maturing of his consultancy firm within the context of contemporary events.
The following year he finally stepped back from being a Director of EIG as well and published a book about his adopted village of Charlbury, in the Cotswolds, where he and his wife Liz had lived since moving there in 1976 (to be near the Bodleian Library in Oxford – in pre-Internet days). ‘Charlbury Then and Now’ is a very personal account which records – and explores the reasons for – many of the changes that had taken place in the village since the time of their arrival. Geoff himself described his discussions of these drivers as a ‘polemic’ and, as noted in a contemporary review of the book, readers were therefore told to expect some forthright views on the Town and Country planning process.
‘Forthright’, then, is probably one of the best words to sum Geoff up. Nobody was ever left in any doubt about his views – on anything! But that alone would be an injustice: he was intensely passionate about the science, history and application of geology and will be remembered more than anything, perhaps, for his major role in helping to bring EIG Conferences Ltd. to where it is today.
In recognition of Geoff’s contributions, the EIG organising committee has agreed to instigate the Geoffrey Walton Prize, to encourage the presentation and publication of papers by early career geoscientists at future EIG conferences.