Performance-Based Seismic Design with Building Information Modelling

Presentation by Dr. Oh-Sung-Kwon, Professor at University of Toronto.

The performance-based seismic design (PBSD) allows engineers to design a structure to comply with specific performance requirements, leading to more predictable behavior when the structure is subjected to earthquake excitation. The PBSD requires nonlinear analyses of a structural system that requires a sophisticated numerical model and considerable computing time. Thus, despite the PBSD method's benefits, the PBSD is not widely adopted in practice except for high-rise buildings or safety-critical structures.

The University of Toronto and Altair have been conducting a collaborative research project to make the PBSD more accessible to practicing engineers. As part of the project, the research team is currently developing a framework with which engineers can quickly generate a nonlinear structure model and conduct a seismic performance assessment of the structure according to state-of-the-art methods in an automated process with minimum user input. The nonlinear model is semi-automatically generated based on the elastic model built in S-Frame following the conventional prescriptive design process. The performance evaluation is based on the state-of-the-art methodology in FEMA P-58. Building Information Modelling (BIM) is integrated into the performance assessment process for accurate and automatic economic loss evaluation by providing a detailed representation of a building's contents. The workflow of the framework will be presented, including an application of the framework to an example building structure.