ABSTRACT
Performance of a structure degrades during its life-cycle, caused by adverse environmental demands (e.g., earthquake, flood) on materials (e.g., corrosion in structural steel and reinforcing steel). A performance-based structural design approach requires consideration of these effects and the uncertainties in the material degradation during its life-cycle performance evaluation. The study described in this paper examines the life-cycle performance of a typical building concrete shear-wall structure in a nuclear facility during an earthquake event. The study uses a Monte Carlo simulation technique for stochastic consideration of degradation of reinforcing steel caused by pitting and uniform corrosion, and the uncertainties in the strength of reinforcing steel, to evaluate the sensitivity of annual probability of failure of the structure to these effects.
