Simplified Procedure for Estimating Earthquake-Induced Deviatoric Slope Displacements
Publication: Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Volume 133, Issue 4
Abstract
A simplified semiempirical predictive relationship for estimating permanent displacements due to earthquake-induced deviatoric deformations is presented. It utilizes a nonlinear fully coupled stick-slip sliding block model to capture the dynamic performance of an earth dam, natural slope, compacted earth fill, or municipal solid-waste landfill. The primary source of uncertainty in assessing the likely performance of an earth/waste system during an earthquake is the input ground motion. Hence, a comprehensive database containing 688 recorded ground motions is used to compute seismic displacements. A seismic displacement model is developed that captures the primary influence of the system’s yield coefficient , its initial fundamental period , and the ground motion’s spectral acceleration at a degraded period equal to . The model separates the probability of “zero” displacement (i.e., ) occurring from the distribution of “nonzero” displacement, so that very low values of calculated displacement do not bias the results. The use of the seismic displacement model is validated through reexamination of 16 case histories of earth dam and solid-waste landfill performance. The proposed model can be implemented rigorously within a fully probabilistic framework or used deterministically to evaluate seismic displacement potential.
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Acknowledgments
Support for this work was provided by the Earthquake Engineering Research Centers Program of the National Science Foundation under Award No. NSFEEC-2162000 through the Pacific Earthquake Engineering Research Center (PEER) under Award Nos. UNSPECIFIEDNC5216 and UNSPECIFIEDNC7236. Additional support was provided by the David and Lucile Packard Foundation. Discussions with Professor Armen Der Kiureghian of the University of California at Berkeley, Professor Ross Boulanger of the University of California at Davis, and Jacob Chacko of Fugro-West Inc. were invaluable.
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Published In
Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Volume 133 • Issue 4 • April 2007
Pages: 381 - 392
Copyright
© 2007 ASCE.
History
Received: Jun 1, 2005
Accepted: Sep 28, 2006
Published online: Apr 1, 2007
Published in print: Apr 2007
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