Seismic Performance Analysis of Spatially Distributed Systems

The objectives of this dissertation have been twofold:
First, an approach to assess seismic damage for spatially distributed systems has been developed. The procedure enables the analyst to evaluate an arbitrary parameter of seismic damage throughout a geographically extensive system. The discussion has included

• the modeling of the seismic environment;
• the modeling of the seismic events themselves, including their felt areas and the distribution of seismic severity within these areas; the modeling of the system as a seismic target;
• the implementation and use of seismic performance relationships to assess the damage incurred by individual system components.

Chapters 2 through 5 have covered these aspects.

A second objective has been the characterization of damage to the system as to enable the analyst to describe its recurrence. Evaluation of recurrence is a necessary step in assessing seismic risk. For this, system-oriented parameters indicating the global response of the system have been discussed. Among several parameters mentioned in Chapter 2, one parameter --global-damage-- has been more extensively described in Chapter 8. Mathematical methods to assess recurrence were addressed in Chapter 6. The main emphasis was placed, not on global-damage per se, but in the implementation of the general methodology of assessing system-oriented response.