Seismic Response of Liquid Storage Tanks Incorporating Soil Structure Interaction
Publication: Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Volume 134, Issue 12
Abstract
A frequency domain method is presented to compute the impulsive seismic response of circular surface mounted steel and concrete liquid storage tanks incorporating soil-structure interaction (SSI) for layered sites. The method introduces the concept of a near field region in close proximity to the mat foundation and a far field at distance. The near field is modeled as a region of nonlinear soil response with strain compatible shear stiffness and viscous material damping. The shear strain in a representative soil element is used as the basis for strain compatibility in the near field. In the far field, radiation damping using low strain soil response is used. Frequency dependent complex dynamic impedance functions are used in a model that incorporates horizontal displacement and rotation of the foundation. The focus of the paper is on the computation of the horizontal shear force and moment on the tank foundation to enable foundation design. Significant SSI effects are shown to occur for tanks sited on soft soil, especially tanks of a tall slender nature. SSI effects take the form of period elongation and energy loss by radiation damping and foundation soil damping. The effects of SSI for tanks are shown to reverse the trend of force and moment reduction under earthquake loading as is usually assumed by designers. The reasons for this important effect in tank design are given in the paper and relate to the very short period of most tanks, hence, period lengthening may result in load increase. A comparison is made with SSI effects evaluated using the code SEI/ASCE 7-02. Period elongation is found to be similar for relatively stiff soils when assessed by the code compared with the results of the dynamic analysis. For soft soils, the agreement is not as good. Code values of system damping are found to agree reasonably well with an assessment based on the dynamic analyses for the range of periods covered by the code. Energy loss by material damping and radiation damping is discussed. It is shown that energy loss may be computed using the complex dynamic impedance function associated with the viscous dashpot in the analytical model. The proportion of energy loss in the translation mode compared to that dissipated in the rotational mode is addressed as a function of the slenderness of the tank. Energy loss increases substantially with the volume of liquid being stored.
Get full access to this article
View all available purchase options and get full access to this article.
Acknowledgments
The helpful suggestions of the reviewers during the course of this paper are gratefully acknowledged.
References
Chiang, V. C. (1974). “Dynamic response of structures in layered soils.” Research Rep. No. R74-10, Dept. of Civil Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Mass.
Cooper, T. W. (1997). “A study of the performance of petroleum storage tanks during earthquakes, 1933–1995.” NIST No. GCR 97-720, U.S. Dept. of Commerce, National Institute of Standards and Technology, Gaithersburgh, Md.
Haroun, M. A., and Housner, G. W. (1981). “Dynamic interaction of liquid storage tanks and foundation soil.” Proc., 2nd ASCE Engineering Mechanical Specialty Conf. on the Dynamic Response of Structures, ASCE, New York, 346–360.
Larkin, T. J. (2002). “The influence of foundation conditions on the earthquake response of two tanks.” Proc., New Zealand Society for Earthquake Engineering Technical Conf. (CD-ROM).
Larkin, T. J. (2003). “Seismic loading and displacement of a tank foundation incorporating soil-structure interaction.” Proc., 2003 Pacific Conf. on Earthquake Engineering (CD-ROM).
Lund, L. V. (1995). “Lifeline utilities lessons, Northridge earthquake.” Proc., 4th U.S. Conf. on Lifeline Earthquake Engineering, ASCE, New York, 676–683.
Malhotra, L. (2000). “Practical nonlinear seismic analysis of tanks.” Earthquake Spectra, 16(2), 473–492.
Poulos, H. G., and Davis, E. H. (1974). Elastic solutions for soil and rock mechanics, Wiley, New York.
SEI/ASCE. (2004). “Minimum design loads for buildings and other structures.” 7-02, ASCE Standard.
Stewart, J. P., Kim, S., Bielak, J., Dobry, R., and Power, M. (2003). “Revisions to soil structure interaction in NEHRP design provisions.” Earthquake Spectra, 19(3), 677–696.
Sun, J. I., Golesorkhi, R., Seed, H. B. (1988). “Dynamic moduli and damping ratios for cohesive soil.” Report No. UCB/EERC-88/15, Earthquake Engineering Research Centre, Univ. of California, Berkeley.
Veletsos, A. S. (1977). “Dynamics of structure foundation systems.” Structural and geotechnical Mechanics, N W Newmark Vol., W. J. Hall, ed., Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 333–361.
Veletsos, A. S. (1984). “Seismic response and design of liquid storage tanks.” Guidelines for the seismic design of oil and gas pipeline systems, Technical Council on Lifeline Earthquake Engineering, ASCE, New York, 255–370; 443–461.
Veletsos, A. S., and Tang, Y. (1990). “Soil-structure interaction effects for laterally excited liquid storage tanks.” Earthquake Eng. Struct. Dyn., 19, 473–496.
Wolf, J. P. (1985). Dynamic soil-structure interaction, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, N.J.
Wolf, J. P., and Deeks, A. J. (2004). Foundation vibration analysis: A strength of materials approach, Elsevier, Oxford, U.K.
Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Volume 134 • Issue 12 • December 2008
Pages: 1804 - 1814
Copyright
© 2008 ASCE.
History
Received: Jan 18, 2007
Accepted: Mar 24, 2008
Published online: Dec 1, 2008
Published in print: Dec 2008
Authors
Metrics & Citations
Metrics
Citations
Download citation
If you have the appropriate software installed, you can download article citation data to the citation manager of your choice. Simply select your manager software from the list below and click Download.