Performance-based earthquake engineering design of reinforced concrete structures using black-box optimisation

Abstract

Earthquake-induced damage of structures has lead researchers to the development of performance-based design (PBD) methodologies. Performance levels in PBD are often specified as safety critical, essential/hazardous, basic and unacceptable levels, and are satisfied via iterative design processes. In this study, it is shown that acceptable performance levels in PBD can be achieved while minimising the corresponding design costs, by casting a simulation-based constraint optimisation problem. Two solution techniques, namely a full factorial design-of-experiment and a non-linear mixed discrete-continuous optimisation, are considered and implemented with the OpenSees system for two design examples: a reinforced concrete column and a portal frame.