Seismic assessment and strengthening of a RC building using pushover analysis

Abstract

Many existing Reinforced Concrete (RC) buildings in moderate to high seismic hazard zones (including old RC buildings and historical structures in Palestine) have inadequate capacity to resist earthquake loads, most of the existing and old buildings were designed and constructed according to earlier codes, which did not satisfy modern seismic design requirements and current engineering standards, as well as other reasons which may also lead to failure such as the faulty structural design and improper construction, alteration of building functions, changes of seismic load characteristics in the area, etc. Procedures of performance-based analysis using nonlinear static analysis (pushover) were used here to study the performance of a proposed RC frame building in different seismic zones in Palestine, the seismic response and performance of these cases were discussed. The results and analyses of the studied cases showed that the proposed steel jacking system managed to avoid the collapse plastic hinges and to reduce displacements and drifts, it was found that the building fulfilled its seismic design criteria after the application of the strengthening strategy.