Seismic performance characterization of Nepali school buildings using a novel micro-modeling approach

Abstract

The ultimate goal of this research is to reduce the seismic vulnerability of school buildings in rural Nepal. Following the 2015 Gorkha earthquake in Nepal, major changes were adopted into seismic design code provisions regarding school construction. Perhaps the most significant change was an intention to regulate school building construction. While seismic design provisions and regulating building practices is a positive step forward, the seismic performance of school buildings built to the newer standards was unknown, or at least not available in the literature. This thesis aims to fill this gap in knowledge by applying a novel micro-modeling approach to developing a finite element model of a rural school building of stone in mud masonry construction typology. The thesis starts by setting the context and high-level motivation for the problem. The foundation of research which this work builds upon is then presented. The construction characteristics of the building typology described above is presented in detail, as well as how structural and material parameters required for the nonlinear dynamic analysis are derived or otherwise obtained. The modeling approach is presented with a description of the wall systems which use a 3D computational method using homogenization for the analysis of general heterogenous thick shell structures. Finally, seismic performance assessment using seven regionally-relevant seismic ground motions is conducted for the modeled building using Incremental Dynamic Analysis. Fragility functions are derived from the IDA results, and used to characterize and discuss the seismic performance of the school building. While more work is needed in this area, this thesis can be used to understand the associated seismic risk of the new designs mandated for school buildings constructed in rural Nepal.