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Civil-Comp Proceedings
ISSN 1759-3433
CCP: 99
PROCEEDINGS OF THE ELEVENTH INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON COMPUTATIONAL STRUCTURES TECHNOLOGY
Edited by: B.H.V. Topping
Paper 244

Progressive Collapse Risk and Robustness of Low-Rise Reinforced Concrete Buildings

L. Bredean, M. Botez and A. Ioani

Department of Structural Mechanics, Faculty of Civil Engineering, Technical University of Cluj-Napoca, Romania

Full Bibliographic Reference for this paper
L. Bredean, M. Botez, A. Ioani, "Progressive Collapse Risk and Robustness of Low-Rise Reinforced Concrete Buildings", in B.H.V. Topping, (Editor), "Proceedings of the Eleventh International Conference on Computational Structures Technology", Civil-Comp Press, Stirlingshire, UK, Paper 244, 2012. doi:10.4203/ccp.99.244
Keywords: progressive collapse potential, seismic design, low-rise buildings, demand capacity ratio.

Summary
In this paper results concerning the progressive collapse potential of low-rise reinforced concrete structures are presented. Low-rise structures with three and six floors were designed according to the provisions of Eurocode 2 [1] and P100-1/2006, the active Romanian Seismic Code [2], for a low and a high seismic zone. The particular behaviour of low-rise buildings in comparison with similar located mid-rise buildings is discussed.

Applying four damage scenarios, as specified in the GSA (2003) Guidelines [3], demand capacity ratio (DCR) values for flexure are computed for each model. The main objectives of the study and corresponding findings are presented as follows:

  1. The effect of prescribed damage scenarios on progressive collapse potential:
    • For a given model, the magnitude of maximum inelastic demands only slightly differs when different "missing column" scenarios are considered, and consequently, the final conclusion concerning the risk level was the same;
    • This finding is original and highly valuable because, on its basis, the final conclusion regarding the progressive collapse potential of a building could be drawn by investigating only one damage scenario instead of four.
  2. The general progressive collapse behaviour of low-rise reinforced concrete framed structures versus mid-rise structures:
    • Low-rise buildings present a higher risk of progressive collapse compared to mid-rise buildings.
  3. The influence of the floors number on the robustness of low-rise structures:
    • The robustness of low-rise buildings located in low seismic zones is not significantly affected by the number of storeys;
    • On the contrary, if the building is designed for a high seismic zone, its robustness strongly depends on the number of floors;
    • The progressive collapse risk decreases when the number of stories increases.
  4. The influence of the seismicity of the area:
    • For the first time in the technical literature, the paper illustrates in a quantitative manner, differentiated with respect to the number of storeys, the positive effect of seismic design and detailing on the progressive collapse resistance of reinforced concrete framed structures.

References
1
SR EN 1992-1-1: 2004, "Eurocode 2: Design of Concrete Structures - Part 1-1: General Rules and Rules for Buildings", ASRO, Bucharest, 2004. (in Romanian)
2
P100-1/2006, "Seismic design code - Part I: Design Rules for Buildings", MTCT, Bucharest, 2006. (in Romanian)
3
U.S. General Service Administration, "Progressive Collapse Analysis and Design Guideline for New Federal Office Buildings and Major Modernisation Projects", Washington D.C., June 2003.

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