Risk-Based Seismic Evaluation of Reinforced Concrete Buildings

Seismic resiliency of new buildings has improved over the years due to improved seismic codes and design practices. However, vulnerability of seismically deficient older buildings, designed and built on the basis of older codes of practices, poses a significant threat to life safety and survivability of buildings. It is economically not feasible to retrofit the entire inventory of seismically deficient buildings. Therefore, there is need for a comprehensive plan to identify critical buildings and prioritize their retrofit and upgrading requirements. A risk-based evaluation technique is proposed in this paper to quantify seismic assessment and develop a ranking scheme for reinforced concrete buildings. The seismic hazard, building vulnerability and consequence of failure are handled in hierarchical structures. Some of the input risk parameters, expressed as qualitative and quantitative quantifiers, are transformed into commensurable values. A knowledge-based fuzzy rule base modelling is developed and verified through the use of 1994 Northridge Earthquake data on seismic damage of reinforced concrete buildings.