Projects / Programmes
Seismic Stress Test of Built Environment
| Code |
Science |
Field |
Subfield |
| 2.01.04 |
Engineering sciences and technologies |
Civil engineering |
Earthquake engineering |
| Code |
Science |
Field |
| T230 |
Technological sciences |
Building construction |
| Code |
Science |
Field |
| 2.01 |
Engineering and Technology |
Civil engineering |
Community resilience, Seismic risk, Stress test, Seismic performance certificate of building and built environment, BIM, High-throughput computing
Researchers (10)
Organisations (2)
Abstract
Only a few strong earthquakes, which hit Italy (L'Aquila 2009, Emilia-Romagna 2012, Norcia 2016) in recent years, have caused hundreds of casualties, economic loss of tens of billions of euros, social distress and enormous difficulties of community to recover from disasters. Similar earthquakes may occur in other parts of Europe, including in Slovenia and to some extent in Austria, where renovation costs could quickly exceed community capacity to recover. Current regulation in Europe is not designed in a way that would enhance the community seismic resilience since the problem of seismic safety of a building and the built environment is not addressed as a coupled problem, leading to a paradox. When designing a new building or redesigning an existing building (e.g. due to energy conservation measures), civil engineers have access to detailed building data. Because the data is not transferred to the level of the built environment, stakeholders do not obtain high quality information about seismic risk of built environment. As a consequence, it can be concluded that current regulations for establishing the community seismic resilience are in conflict with the EU's Digital Agenda and the Slovenia’s Smart Specialization Strategy, which foresees digitization with intensive and innovative use of information and communication technology (ICT). In addition, current regulations are not consistent with the guidelines of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030 (UN, 2015), where evaluation and understanding of risk due to natural disasters is the first objective towards enhancement of community resilience against natural disasters.
The objective of the project is the development of a stress test for evaluation of the seismic risk, which would systematically couple the analyses of the building and the built environment levels, and provide high quality information about the seismic risk for all stakeholders. Systematic coupling of the two levels of analyses will be achieved by introducing a building information model (BIM), which will contain key data about the buildings and analysis results obtained from detailed analyses at building level. The BIMs of individual buildings can subsequently be used at the level of the built environment in order to perform physically-based simulations of its seismic response at the system scale. The research will focus on masonry and reinforced concrete buildings, which represent the vast majority of the building stock in Slovenia and Austria. Existing seismotectonic models will be used to simulate ground motions at the site of the buildings that are part of the considered built environment. The proposed seismic risk assessment procedure will use methods developed in previous projects carried out by the leading research group. The results will be presented in a form of a Building’s Seismic Performance Certificate. The seismic response analysis at the building level will be based on simplified nonlinear analysis, as it is also prescribed in Eurocode 8. The proposed probabilistic framework will couple seismic hazard, structural response, structural damage and losses in terms of costs/repair time.
The outcomes of this project will serve as basis for establishing contemporary regulations to strengthen community resilience in response to earthquakes and other natural hazards. Stakeholders such as property owners, regulators, industry, authorities, etc. will benefit from the established methodology.
The project is a continuation of the previous projects carried out at University of Ljubljana. The project consortium consists of the University of Ljubljana, the University of Innsbruck, and the Austrian-Slovenian design company ELEA iC. Slovenian-Austrian cooperation in the project will also have a symbolic meaning, since the project will end on the 125th anniversary of the Ljubljana earthquake. The aid from Vienna at that time was crucial for the recovery of community and reconstruction of Lj
Significance for science
The basic scientific outcome of the project will be a new approach for dealing with earthquake risk of the built environment. This approach will facilitate the flow of information from the level of the building to the level of the built environment. It will allow for physically-based simulations of seismic risk of the built environment. Consequently, the community resilience against extreme natural phenomena will be strengthened, which is the focus of the declaration of Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030 (UN, 2015). This declaration summarizes the outcomes of the Third UN World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction (UNISDR, 2015).
The planned research aims at developing a methodology and a computing environment to carry out seismic stress tests of the built environment. This problem has not yet been adequately solved worldwide and is important also for Slovenia and Austria. The computing environment will be supported ICT and high-performance computing system both in Slovenia and Austria. Research is fundamental and will contribute to the global treasury of knowledge in several areas, whereas the ultimate goal is the development of a relatively simple procedure that will be useful in everyday practice of built environment management. The results will open up new areas of science in earthquake engineering, civil engineering, economics and other social sciences (e.g. development of models for setting performance objectives in earthquake-resistant design of buildings and models for strengthening the community resilience against earthquakes). At the same time a user-friendly version of this tool will allow practical implementation of seismic stress tests in the public and private sectors.
The simplified nonlinear N2 method for seismic analysis of structures, developed within the Slovenian research group, is a worldwide recognized method, which has been implemented in the Eurocode 8. New insights on the applicability of this method for response evaluation of buildings with insufficient data are expected. Important developments are also expected with respect to vulnerability and loss functions, as well as building information modelling (BIM), which will contain all key data on the seismic capacity of the building, which are necessary for seismic risk analyses at the level of built environment.
The project team from University of Ljubljana belong to the Earthquake Engineering and E-Construction research groups, which have formal and informal cooperation with many research centres around the world. Therefore, the research project will be to a great extent coordinated with the research in leading research centres involved in earthquake engineering, seismology and resilience against natural disasters. It can thus be expected that the outcomes will lay the foundations for high-quality information on seismic risk, which is crucial to increase the resilience of community against extreme natural phenomena.
Significance for the country
Results of the project will provide the basis for launching a data collecting system regarding the earthquake resistance of buildings at the national level (Slovenia and Austria), and in further consequence, for decision-making on measures required for reducing seismic risk. The developed methodology and computational environment will constitute a tool for practical implementation of seismic stress tests in the public and private sectors. National and local authorities will be able to set up a system for strengthening the awareness, preparedness and resilience of community against earthquakes and their impacts, associated with better communication between civil protection unit, owners and other stakeholders. Additionally, public administration will have a tool at hand for digitization of seismic risk assessment. Thus, the aims of the research project are consistent with the EU's Digital Agenda, anticipating intensive use of ICT technologies. Furthermore, the project theme couples two pillars of Slovenia’s Smart Specialization Strategy, i.e., the promotion of smart buildings and smart cities and communities. The objective of enhancing resilience of community is also a key area of research in the next financial period of the research program Horizon 2020.
In the private sector, the developed system can be used, for instance, by insurance companies to assess the seismic risk of their portfolio of insured buildings. Similarly, real estate companies will be in the position to release information on the earthquake risk of their objects in real estate portals, a novel desirable customer service.
The resulting methodology will open new market opportunities for ICT companies, for example, by initiating the development of web-based and smartphone applications. These application will allow property owners to simulate the expected losses in the case if buildings were hit by ground motions recorded during a recent earthquake. Consequently, the awareness of owners on seismic risk will be sharpened when the effect of actual earthquakes in in L'Aquila, Norcia, etc. will be simulated for their buildings.
The new methodology and gained knowledge, published in international and domestic professional literature and forwarded to those who are responsible for mitigation of consequences of natural disasters, will support rational decision-making regarding strengthening of seismically non-resistant buildings and preparation of actions in the event of a strong earthquake. Ultimately, the results will contribute to safer buildings with increased seismic resistance and to the reduction of casualties and damage on buildings and infrastructure in future strong-motion seismic events.
Most important scientific results
Interim report,
final report
Most important socioeconomically and culturally relevant results
Interim report,
final report
