Comparison of Simplified and Specific Stress-Based Procedures to Evaluate Liquefaction Potential Using Cone Penetration Tests: A Case of Study in the Coastal Area of Mayaguez, Puerto Rico

Analysis of liquefaction and its consequences remains one of the more active areas of research and development in geotechnical engineering. In 1998, a consensus was reached within the technical community on the use of an empirical stress-based approach for liquefaction triggering assessment, called the simplified method. However, regulatory codes and the standard-of-practice recommend performing specific stress-based studies and site response analysis to estimate liquefaction potential. This work presents a comparison between these two approaches to evaluate liquefaction potential. The city of Mayagüez, Puerto Rico, is chosen as the study area because of the high presence of alluvium sand deposits and the complex tectonic setting that surrounds the island. General results indicate that the coastal area of Mayagüez has a high liquefaction potential (factor of safety <1). The simplified-based method showed to be less conservative than the specific-based method. These results can be attributed to the fact that the latter considers soil site effects.