Soil-structure interaction and optimum seismic design of onshore and offshore energy projects, London

Overview

Society demands increased availability and reliability of energy supply with improved environmental standards. Therefore, the structural and foundation design of onshore or offshore energy projects can be very demanding. It is evident that in the case of spatially distributed energy projects, that traverse remote regions with extreme terrains and/or seabeds, such as a gas pipelines or cables, the design may be more challenging due to the variety of geotechnical conditions and the potential geohazards along the route.

In areas of moderate or high seismicity, the design of energy projects becomes more complicated due to the various types of seismic loading. The seismic loading may be either dynamic due to the inertial forces developed on the mass of the structure(s) and/or quasi-static due to the permanent ground deformations (PGDs) caused by various earthquake-related geohazards, such as active-fault ruptures, slope instabilities, and soil liquefaction phenomena.

Through a series of case studies, the presentation will shed light on these interesting issues of geotechnical earthquake engineering from a structural and a geotechnical perspective. The first part of the presentation focuses on the impact of local site conditions (i.e. soil stratigraphy, bedrock geomorphology, and/or surface topography) on the ground surface motion that will dominate the dynamic structural response. In the second part emphasis is given on the quantitative assessment of the earthquake-related geohazards and the realistic estimation of the PGDs that will actually determine the soil-structure interaction and the structural response / distress. Finally, the third part of the presentation is devoted to remote sensing and early-warning systems that are required for the safe operation of the energy projects.

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