ABSTRACT
Natural draught cooling towers definitely belong to the largest and thinnest industrial buildings at time. Today the load-bearing behavior is widely researched, but there still exist many questions concerning especially the influences of fatigue, cracking and corrosion of reinforced concrete and of non-axisymmetric loading and soil characteristics. Already from the beginning of the state of design the aspects of durability must be considered carefully. To fulfill this demand numerical solutions of the possible damage processes are necessary. Such investigations have been made on the presently world-wide highest natural draught cooling tower at Niederaussem, with an overall height of 200 m, in the lignite area close to Cologne, Germany. At this location the RWE Energy AG expands the existing power plant to increase its efficiency and power. Cause of the existing built-up area the wind situation is very complicated. This is only one factor which makes a special design and building of the tower necessary.
