Safety Evaluation Method for High-Piled Wharf Structures Based on the Disturbing-Energy Method

Many high-piled wharves were built in the last century, and some wharf members have been damaged over decades of operation. It is important to use effective means to evaluate the safety status and durability of these high-piled wharf structures and guide reinforcement efforts. At present, the most common safety status evaluation methods for high-piled wharves are site inspections, crack detection, and concrete strength tests. However, it is difficult to provide quantitative safety indicators using these methods. In this paper, a disturbing-energy method is proposed for the safety assessment of high-piled wharves based on the variational principle and minimum potential energy principle. The geometric nonlinear effect is introduced, and formulations are derived for calculating the disturbing energy. A concentric compression bar example is presented to validate the proposed method through a comparison analysis between the Euler method and disturbing-energy method. Through several cases involving different loads applied to the same high-piled wharf structure, the same load applied to different structures, overall stiffness degradation, and member damage, the disturbing-energy method is shown to reflect very well the safety condition or damage condition of the high-piled wharf structure. The disturbing-energy method can also be used to identify the failure path of the structure and optimize the form of the wharf structure.