1. RC Book: Design of Reinforced Concrete Buildings for Seismic performance
   
2. PLOTO: Modeling and assessment for resilient inland waterways
   
3. TWINCITY: Digital twins for resilient urban areas under multiple hazards
   
4. METIS: Methods and tools innovations for seismic risk assessment
   
5. YADES: Training on improved resilience and sustainable reconstruction of cultural heritage areas
   
6. HYPERION: Improved resilience and sustainable reconstruction of historic areas
   
7. NSFuse: Ductile steel fuses for the protection of critical nonstructural components
   
8. PANOPTIS: Decision support system for increasing the resilience of transportation infrastructure
   
9. ARCHYTAS: Archetypal telemetry and decision support system for the protection of monumental structures
   
10. INFRASTRESS: Improving resilience of sensitive industrial plants & infrastructures exposed to cyber-physical threats
    
11. DISSIPABLE: Fully dissipative and easily repairable devices for resilient buildings with composite steel concrete structures
    
12. STEELWAR: Advanced structural solutions for automated steelrack supported warehouses
    
13. ANGELHY: Innovative solutions for design and strengthening of telecommunications and transmission lattice towers
    
14. EQUALJOINTS-PLUS: Valorisation of knowledge for European pre-qualified steel joints
    
15. ATC-120: Seismic analysis and design of nonstructural components and systems
    
16. Reliability of Coupled High-Speed Trains and Bridges Under Earthquakes
    
17. INNOSEIS: Valorisation of innovative seismic devices
    
18. iDesign: Enabling Seismic Design Decision-Making under Uncertainty
    
19. SeaWind: Performance-based design of offshore wind turbines
    
20. GEM-GVC: Seismic Vulnerability Guidelines Development and Seismic Vulnerability Functions
    
21. RASOR: Risk assessment for the seismic protection of industrial facilities

www.ploto-project.eu

PLOTO aims at increasing the resilience of the Inland WaterWays (IWW) infrastructures and the connected land- infrastructures, thus ensuring reliable network availability under unfavourable conditions, such as extreme weather, accidents and other kind of hazards. Our main target is to combine downscaled climate change scenarios (applied to IWW infrastructures) with simulation tools and actual data, so as to provide the relevant authorities and their operators with an integrated tool able to support more effective management of their infrastructures at strategic and operational levels. Towards this direction, PLOTO aims to:

• use high resolution modelling data for the determination and the assessment of the climatic risk of the selected transport infrastructures and associated expected damages;
  
• use existing data from various sources with new types of sensor-generated data (computer vision) to feed the used simulator;
  
• utilize tailored weather forecasts (combining seamlessly all available data sources) for specific hot-spots, providing early warnings with corresponding impact assessment in real time;
  
• develop improved multi-temporal, multi-sensor UAV- and satellite-based observations with robust spectral analysis, computer vision and machine learning-based assessment for diverse transport infrastructures;
  
• design and implement an integrated Resilience Assessment Platform environment as an innovative planning tool that will permit a quantitative resilience assessment through an end-to-end simulation environment, running "what-if" impact/risk/resilience assessment scenarios. The effects of adaptation measures can be investigated by changing the hazard, exposure and vulnerability input parameters;
  
• design and implement a Common Operational Picture, including an enhanced visualisation interface and an Incident Management System.
  

twincity.ntua.gr

What is the impact of a prolonged pandemic shutdown on an urban community? How much and how long would it cost to rebuild a town after a severe storm or a strong earthquake? What would the impact of climate change be on an Aegean island fifty years from today? How could one best mitigate such risks by leveraging policies and financial tools? The National Technical University of Athens in co-operation with the Finnish Meteorological Institute, Resilience Guard Gmbh, RED Risk Spa and researchers from the University of Notre Dame, Texas Tech, EPFL and AUTH are proposing the creation of the TwinCity platform to answer exactly these questions. TwinCity aims to leverage existing tools and services (e.g., climate models, modelling of extreme events and their impacts, EU services, etc.), and develop novel technologies (Layered-Block Models, City Digital Twins) to deliver an integrated socioeconomic resilience assessment platform, addressing multi-hazard risk understanding, better preparedness, faster, adapted and efficient response, and sustainable reconstruction of urban areas. Taking advantage of the unique opportunity offered by the COVID-19 quarantine to calibrate for the effect of business shutdown and recovery, TwinCity offers a robust digital twin of an urban area that accounts for local socioeconomic and business ecosystems to run end-to-end simulations of multiple "what-if" disruption scenarios. The final goal is to offer an open-source basis upon which performance, risk and resilience can be assessed by stake-holders, to be tested with a large-scale pilot study of an island Greek town subject to earthquake and weather/climate hazards.

www.metis-project.eu

The proposed project intends to translate research to practice through rigorous and efficient methodologies and tools to assess seismic safety of NPP. It also has the aim to innovate current practice by supporting simulation results with experimental data and experience feedback in the framework of Bayesian approaches and machine learning. The research will develop methods to improve the predictability of (non linear, best-estimate) beyond design analyses (design extension earthquakes). The refined seismic PSA provides meaningful support in the decision making process and could be useful for real time expertise of plant safety in case of temporary unavailability of safety relevant equipment or structures. It is also proposed to develop efficient tools to identify major contributors to risk such that efforts to increase safety and resistance are focused on relevant equipment. The outcome will thus increase the reliability of the analyses and in turn increase confidence in the probabilistic and deterministic safety assessment results. The results of this project will then help nuclear operators in their periodic safety reviews and to respond to the high-level EU-wide safety objectives of the amended EURATOM nuclear safety directive (stress tests). The considered accident scenarios will provide input for updating severe accident management guidelines (SAMG).

www.yades-project.eu

YADES aims to efficiently train a network of fellows on the field of the resilience of Cultural Heritage (CH) areas and historic cities against Climate Change (CC) and other types of hazards. Towards this direction, YADES aims to introduce a research framework for downscaling the created climate and atmospheric composition as well as associated risk maps down to the 1x1 km (historic area) scale, and specific damage functions for CH materials. Applying atmospheric modelling for specific CC scenarios at such refined spatial and time scales allows for an accurate quantitative and qualitative impact assessment of the estimated micro-climatic and atmospheric stressors. YADES will perform combined structural/geotechnical analysis of the CH sites and damage assessment under normal and changed conditions, based on the climatic zone, the micro-climate conditions, the petrographic and textural features of building materials, historic data for the structures, the effect of previous restoration processes and the environmental/physical characteristics of the surrounding environment. The data coming from installed monitoring system will be coupled with simulated data (under our cultural heritage resilience assessment platform- CHRAP) and will be further analysed through our data management system, while supporting communities' participation and public awareness. The data from the monitoring system will feed the DSS so as to provide proper adaptation and mitigation strategies. The produced vulnerability map will be used by the local authorities to assess the threats of CC (and other natural hazards), visualize the buily heritage and cultural landscape under future climate scenarios, model the effects of different adaptation strategies, and ultimately prioritize any rehabilitation actions to best allocate funds in both pre- and post-event environments. To train the fellows, the project will make use of extensive workshop ad training sessions, as well organise summer schools.

www.hyperion-project.eu

HYPERION aims to introduce a research framework for downscaling the created climate and atmospheric composition as well as associated risk maps down to the 1x1 km (historic area) scale, and specific damage functions for Cultural Heritage (CH) materials. Applying atmospheric modelling for specific Climate Change (CC) scenarios at such refined spatial and time scales allows for an accurate quantitative and qualitative impact assessment of the estimated micro-climatic and atmospheric stressors. HYPERION will perform combined hygrothermal and structural/geotechnical analysis of the CH sites (indoor climate, HVAC, related strains and stresses, etc.) and damage assessment under normal and changed conditions, based on the climatic zone, the micro-climate conditions, the petrographic and textural features of building materials, historic data for the structures, the effect of previous restoration processes and the environmental/physical characteristics of the surrounding environment. The data coming from the integrated monitoring system will be coupled with simulated data (under our holistic resilience assessment platform-HRAP) and will be further analysed through our data management system, while supporting communities' participation and public awareness. The data from the monitoring system will feed the DSS so as to provide proper adaptation and mitigation strategies, and support sustainable reconstruction plans for the CH damages. The produced vulnerability map will be used by the local authorities to assess the threats of CC (and other natural hazards), visualize the built heritage and cultural landscape under future climate scenarios, model the effects of different adaptation strategies, and ultimately prioritize any rehabilitation actions to best allocate funds in both pre- and post-event environments. The project outcomes will be demonstrated to four European historic areas in Norway, Spain, Italy and Greece (representing different climatic zones).

sera-ta.eucentre.it/sera-ta-project-21

The testing and experimental/analytical verification of a controlled yielding fuse concept is proposed for the seismic protection of critical nonstructural components. The objective is to offer a reliable and inexpensive solution for the protection of acceleration- and drift-sensitive equipment, such as mechanical components, HVAC units and medical devices that underpin the functionality of nearly all buildings. Recent events have showcased the vulnerability of non structural components to even low- or moderate-intensity earthquakes that occur far more frequently that design-level events. Thus, critical facilities are often crippled for months despite having suffered little structural damage, clearly failing in the much-sought-after objective of resilience. The problem lies in the dynamics of narrowband excitations appearing at the floors (and ceilings) of buildings and the corresponding resonant response of many rigidly-connected components, introducing component accelerations that can exceed 5 times the (already amplified) peak floor response. In contrast, a controlled yielding anchor offers a reliable detuning effect that only requires a minor ductility of 1.5 - 2.0 to achieve reductions in acceleration and deformation demands by factors of 2 to 3. Still, an actual verification of this concept and a prototype design of such a fuse-like yielding element are yet to appear. The proposed project aims to comprehensively fulfill this need by offering an innovative experimental campaign featuring an easily-modifiable specimen, replaceable sacrificial elements, and multiple input acceleration timehistories from instrumented buildings to test the yielding fuse concept to satisfaction.

www.panoptis.eu

The purpose of the PANOPTIS project is to improve the resiliency (ability to adapt) of the road infrastructures and ensuring reliable network availability under unfavourable conditions, such as extreme weather, landslides, and earthquakes. The project's main goal is to combine down-scale climate change scenarios (applied to road infrastructure) with structural and geotechnical simulation tools, and with actual data from sensors (terrestrial and airborne) so as to provide the operators with an integrated tool able to support more effective management of their infrastructures at planning, maintenance and operation level. The following technologies will be implemented in the PANOPTIS tool:

• Reliable quantification of climatic, hydrological and atmospheric stressors
• Multi-Hazard vulnerability modules and assessment toolkit
• Development of a forecasting module to provide high-resolution tailored weather and precipitation forecasts
• Improved prediction of structural and geotechnical safety risk through the use of Geotechnical and Structural Simulation Tool (SGSA)
• Improved multi-temporal, multi-sensor observations with robust spectral analysis, computer vision and Machine Learning (ML) damage diagnostic for diverse Road Infrastructures (RI).
• Detailed and wide area transport asset mapping, integrating state-of-the-art mobile mapping and making use of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) technology
• Design of a Holistic Resilience Assessment Platform (HRAP)
• Design of a Common Operational Picture (COP) including a Decision Support System (DSS), an enhanced visualization interface and an Incident Management System (IMS)

archytas.ntua.gr

The project proposes the development of an intelligent platform for remotely monitoring monumental structures, promptly diagnosing their potential for instability and making subsequent decisions on taking remedial actions. It is a timely proposal that is developed in cooperation with the Ministry of Culture to protect the entirety of the monumental structures in Greece, through the accurate diagnosis and the assessment of the estimated micro-climatic and atmospheric stressors. HYPERION will perform combined prioritization of rehabilitation needs, aiming to optimize the distribution of available funds. For this purpose, two discrete levels of system deployment are offered. The first requires minimal resources and involves the use of software for risk assessment under multiple environmental hazards (earthquake, wind, flood, deterioration, ageing). It employs probabilistic methods and models to estimate the risk of instability and offers some remote monitoring capabilities through local or regional measuring of the intensity of environmental actions. At the second level, a sensor network is deployed at the monument and connected to the remote monitoring platform, offering continuous up-to-date information to optimize the accuracy of instability prediction via the risk assessment software.

The platform will be validated via its pilot application to two emblematic monuments of Classical Antiquity:
a) the Horologion of Andronikos Kyrrhestes (Tower of the Winds) in the Roman Forum of Athens and b) the Temple of (Athena) Aphaea in Aegina Island. The exploitation of the platform is expected to offer considerable direct and indirect benefits, both for the research and industrial partners, as well as for the Agencies of the Ministry of Culture and the Greek state.

infrastress.eu

InfraStress addresses cyber-physical (C/P) security of Sensitive Industrial Plants and Sites (SIPS) Critical Infrastructures (CI) and improves resilience and protection capabilities of SIPS exposed to large scale, combined, C/P threats and hazards, and guarantee continuity of operations, while minimizing cascading effects in the infrastructure itself, the environment, other CIs, and citizens in vicinity, at reasonable cost. In fact, InfraStress will develop TRL4+ solutions from preceding research and innovation towards TRL7 level producing maximum adoption of the proposed methods and solutions. Addressing the current fragmentation of the available security solutions and technology, InfraStress will provide an integrated framework including cyber and physical threat detection, integrated C/P Situational Awareness, Threat Intelligence, and an innovative methodology for resilience assessment - all tailored to each site.
InfraStress adopts a user-driven approach carried out through: a) delivery of usable and user-friendly Services and Applications for C/P protection and resilience; b) technical activities driven by and receiving active input from end users, i.e. SIPS and relevant stakeholders; c) a comprehensive set of 5 real-world Pilots and Evaluation activities to be carried out by User Partners.
InfraStress matches key impacts not only in response to the Work Programme Call but also at Strategic, Socio-economic and Market levels. In fact InfraStress was concerned since the beginning with a strong business vision in mind and will carry out effective exploitation actions ensureing successful go-to-market. Tailored activities are also planned to rise a culture of participatory security to involve all stakeholders including companies, workers, public authorities, citizens and civil society.
InfraStress involves 27 partners of excellence from 11 countries with very cross-cutting and complementary competences and excellent track records, including 5 SIPS operators.

dissipable.ntua.gr

Anti-seismic devices previously designed and characterized within RFCS Projects by the proposal's authors will be further developed taking into account the experience collected so far. Optimized structural systems will be proposed, with improved dissipation, reliability and reparability features. Single storey buildings with seismic resistance provided by the improved devices will be built and subjected to strong earthquakes. Systematic post-earthquake repair and reassembly procedures for these buildings applied and provided as "instructions for use". Ability of repaired systems to resist strong earthquakes will be examined. Economic and environmental benefits and improved resiliency properties of the proposed systems will be quantified.

Image credits: www.logiksrl.it, www.sacmaspa.com

Automated Rack Supported Warehouses (ARSW) represent the future of storage technology, providing substantial savings in terms of cost, space and energy with respect to traditional warehouses. Currently, designers refer to building codes, without any control of their correct applicability to the specific typologies of these peculiar steel structures. This creates important safety and efficiency problems because ARSWs' structural characteristics are considerably different from those of normal steel structures for buildings. Basing on an accurate evaluation of safety level of the design concepts actually adopted in current practice (in the total absence of specific design codes), the main objective of the proposal is the definition of dedicated innovative design approaches for ARSWs in not seismic and seismic conditions. In particular, attention will be focused on loading conditions that characterize the ARSWs during its installation and service life and on ductile design under seismic loading. Based on such analysis specific design rules and recommendations will be carried out for erection and design of ARSWs.

angelhy.ntua.gr

Angle sections are extensively used in lattice towers and masts for telecommunication or electricity transmission. In addition, single or built-up sections made of angles are used in a wide field of civil engineering applications including buildings, bridges or for strengthening existing structures. However, there is a lack of consistent European rules for design for members made of angle profiles. Recent developments have led to a wider application of large angle sections made of high strength steel, for which European design rules are missing. Due to increasing loads, strengthening of existing towers, especially for communication, is an issue faced in everyday practice. However, design codes cover only one specific configuration.
The objective of this proposal is the development of design rules that exploit the carrying potential of angle sections, including large angles from high strength steel, the improvement of existing rules for built-up sections and the incorporation of innovative types of built-up sections composed of two angles with unequal sections. In addition, hybrid profiles composed of angle sections and FRP plates will be investigated and relevant design rules developed. Such hybrid members provide innovative and cost effective solutions for strengthening existing lattice towers. Experimental and numerical investigations will be performed at the level of cross sections, members, as well as of structural tower sub-assemblies to incorporate the influence of realistic connection conditions, existing eccentricities and load shedding between tower walls. Case studies will be examined and a performance-based assessment of the actual system safety will be conducted incorporating uncertainties in loads, material and geometry. A comprehensive evaluation of the reliability infused by the new design rules will be made. The proposed rules will be integrated in design software for towers.

steelconstruct.com/equaljoints

Within the previous RFCS project EQUALJOINTS (RFSR-CT-2013-00021), seismic prequalification criteria of steel joints have been developed. This proposal aims at the valorisation, the dissemination and the extension of the developed prequalification criteria for practical applications to a wide audience (i.e. academic institutions, Engineers and architects, construction companies, steel producers). The main objectives of the proposal are the following:

• To collect and organize informative material concerning the prequalified joint typologies: informative documents will be prepared in 12 languages (English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Dutch, Portuguese, Czech, Bulgarian, Romanian, Greek, and Slovenian);
• To develop pre-normative design recommendations of seismically qualified joints on the basis of results from Equaljoints project;
• To develop design guidelines in order to design steel structures accounting for the type of joints and their relevant non-linear response;
• To develop a software and an app for mobile to predict the inelastic response of joints;
• To organize seminars (2) and workshops (14) for disseminating the gained knowledge over EU and internationally. Workshops and seminars will be organized in the own-countries of partners involved in the project as well as in United States of America (USA). With this regard, since in EQUALJOINTS dog-bone joints with heavy sections have been qualified using US shapes produced in Europe, the organization of seminars in USA will be an important opportunity to get to the US Market, consolidating the gain of European economy and having beneficial impact on exportation of European products in USA;
• To create a web site with free access to the users in order to promote the obtained results;
• To create a You-Tube channel to make available the videos of the experimental tests and simulations to show the evolution of damage pattern.

www.atcouncil.org/atc-120

NIST GCR 13-917-23, Development of NIST Measurement Science R&D Roadmap: Earthquake Risk Reduction in Buildings (developed by the Building Seismic Safety Council (BSSC) of the National Institute for Building Sciences (NIBS) for NIST in 2013) identified nonstructural issues as a top priority need for problem-focused studies related to earthquake engineering for new and existing buildings. The report identified four critical areas related to nonstructural design criteria needing focused study:

1. the vertical distribution of nonstructural design forces over the height of a building, Fp;
2. the response modification coefficients for nonstructural components; Rp;
3. the overstrength factors used in the design of nonstructural anchorage; and
4. nonstructural component and system performance metrics.

High speed railway (HSR) lines extend for thousands of kilometres many within earthquake prone areas. In the greater China region, bridges may constitute even more than 80% of the total length of a HSR line. As a consequence, the likelihood a running train is on a bridge during earthquake shaking is far greater than otherwise. At the speed levels HSR trains operate (250-350 km/h) seismic events that are of little significance for the integrity of the bridge might represent a credible threat for the train's running safety. Such low to moderateintensity earthquakes are common even in low seismicity areas like the Guangdong region. In the very short lifetime of HSR, trains have already derailed on bridges shaken by earthquakes.
Traditional earthquake engineering focuses on bridges and major earthquakes. In contrast, HSR are coupled vehicle-bridge systems vulnerable also to the exponentially more frequent moderate earthquakes. This research focuses on the interdisciplinary area linking bridge and vehicle dynamics to examine the seismic response of coupled train-bridge systems. To assess the safety of trains running on seismically-vibrating bridges research usually relies on indirect methods such as force-based metrics or geometric criteria. This prevents a more realistic estimation of direct and indirect earthquake consequences for HSR train-bridges and hinders the quantification of the seismic risk.
The overriding goal of this research is to assess, analytically and numerically, the seismic safety and reliability of HSR train-bridge systems. To this end it will develop an original seismic analysis scheme capable of simulating different failure modes of the coupled train-bridge system including train derailment and overturning, and bridge damage. Subsequently, this research will establish, for the first time, a probabilistic performance-based seismic assessment framework tailored to HSR train-bridge systems. In this context, it will account for the uncertainties characterizing the earthquake-bridge-train problem. Upon completion the proposed research will assess the consequences of train-bridge seismic damage and operation disruption, in terms of casualties, monetary loss and lost time. The envisaged methodology will provide a risk-decision support framework needed to assess the efficiency of possible mitigation measures such as tuning of early warning systems, operational speed adjustment, and modification of design guidelines.
The proposed research can lead to seminal and timely advances in the areas of bridge, infrastructure and earthquake engineering related to the analysis of coupled train-bridge systems and their safety. This is a high-priority research area that is attracting international attention and major funding.

innoseis.ntua.gr

Valorization actions for 12 innovative anti-seismic devices will be undertaken. The devices were recently developed in the frame of RFCS, EU and national research projects by the partners involved in the project. Information documents for all devices will be produced for dissemination to all partners of the construction sector such as Architects, structural Engineers, construction companies, steel producers and all potential decision makers of the construction sector. These documents will be bundled in a volume for dissemination. The volume will be translated in several European languages. Criteria will be set on which it may be decided which of the devices are subject to CE marking in accordance with EN 15129 and which may be considered as innovative systems that require a code approval in EN 1998-1. For the latter pre-normative design recommendations will be drafted that will allow them to receive the status of code-approved systems. A reliability based methodological procedure to define values of behavior factors (qfactors) for building structures will be established. This procedure will be applied in turn to determine q-factors for structural systems with the anticipated devices. Case studies with application examples in which the devices are employed will be worked out. The case studies refer to new single story steel buildings, new multi-story steel-concrete composite buildings and to interventions for seismic upgrading of existing buildings. Seminars and Workshops will be organized in large parts of Europe. In addition, Seminars will ne organized in non-European Mediterranean high seismicity countries to promote technologies and codes developed in Europe. A web site with free access to the users will be created and promoted to practice. Printed and electronic material will be produced and disseminated to all involved in the construction sector

Figure 1: An efficient algorithm based on Latin Hypercube Sampling is employed to estimate the dispersion due to model parameter uncertainty in the seismic capacity of a 9-story steel moment-resisting frame. Using 160 (right) versus 10 (left) realizations of the uncertain model significantly tightens the estimates around the correct answer (red line).

Figure 2: We seek to design a 4-story steel frame building for a high-seismicity site. The hazard surface (left) shows the frequency of different levels of seismic excitation (spectral acceleration) being exceeded at the site for potential (currently unknown) vibration periods of the building. The Yield Frequency Spectra (right) help the engineer find the appropriate period and strength of the structure, shown in the lower right corner, by selecting the closest curve that lies below the specified performance objectives. These are the red X symbols, each representing a maximum allowable frequency of a given global ductility (or damage) occurring in the building.

The primary objective is the development of a simple yet accurate method for performance-based design of structures in seismic areas. In essence, we seek to revolutionize the standard process that every professional structural engineer undertakes to design a structure subject to seismic forces. The reason is that recent earthquakes have shown that buildings reflecting current design approaches may reduce the rate of fatalities, but often result to staggering monetary losses and disruption of functionality. Thus, earthquakes can still financially cripple entire cities, or even countries.

To holistically quantify such effects, the concept of “seismic performance” is employed. This characterizes the behavior of a given structure under seismic loads. Ideally this is based on the use of metrics that are of immediate use to engineers, e.g., story forces and deformations, but also to stakeholders, such as monetary losses, human casualties and time-to-repair (or replace). At a simpler level, one may quantify damage by using simpler engineering metrics such as global ductility or maximum interstory drift. “Performance-based” earthquake engineering is concerned with tackling the dual problems of assessment and design. Assessment is the direct process of estimating the performance of a given (existing) structure. Design is the inverse problem, whereby a (new or rehabilitated) structure, its members and properties are sought to assure a desired performance under a given seismic hazard. As typically befitting such dualities, the direct path of assessment is by far the simpler of the two. Designing a structure to achieve a desired level of performance is an indirect process that is currently solvable only through arduous iterations: It is simply not applicable in practice. To make things worse, the considerable uncertainty inherent in earthquakes (i.e., when, where, how intense) and structures (what has been constructed versus what was designed on paper, what are the material properties, issues of corrosion, aging etc.) make this problem even more difficult.

To offer a practicable path for performance-based design, three important innovations have been introduced. First, a computationally efficient approach is proposed for rapidly establishing the effect of model uncertainties on the seismic performance (Figure 1). This allows the quantification of the consequences of uncertainties and their inclusion in subsequent analyses. Second, a simplified, yet accurate formula is offered for evaluating the seismic performance in terms of the mean annual frequency of damage occurring in the building. Thus, intuition is gained on the structural parameters that influence the seismic behavior of the building, while an analytical estimation of the building performance becomes possible. Finally, the concept of Yield Frequency Spectra (Figure 2) is developed, whereby an engineer can directly determine the required strength and stiffness of the structure given the seismic hazard at the building site and the owner's requirements on how frequently it sustains low or high levels of damage. Both analytical approximations and accurate numerical solutions are available, encoded in open-source software that can estimate Yield Frequency Spectra within seconds to provide a reliable design basis for any building and any user requirements.

A holistic methodology for performance-based wind/wave engineering is proposed to develop criteria for the feasibility evaluation and selection of optimum configuration of offshore wind turbines. Considering both fixed and floating alternatives, for intermediate water depths and for wind/wave conditions encountered in Greek and Chinese seas, a comprehensive probabilistic approach will be formulated to optimize engineering decisions and associated initial and total investment costs within the expected lifetime of a wind park. Thus, performance based design methodologies that are widely used in earthquake engineering, will be evolved for wind/wave engineering, a process posing significant scientific and technological challenges and promises. This research effort is in line with recent strong trends towards renewable energy sources world-wide and in Greece and China in particular. To that effect, a consortium of participants from industry and the academia has come together, encompassing all aspects of design, construction and operation of wind turbines. Expected outcomes of the project include:

• Calibrated detailed and simplified models for fixed and floating offshore wind turbines
• Performance-based design and assessment methodology
• Environmental contours and hazard surfaces for wind/wave action in a pilot region
• Preliminary design guidelines for different typologies of offshore wind turbines
• Pilot preliminary designs
• Feasibility studies

Part of the effort of the Global Earthquake Model (GEM) Foundation is to compile a library of seismic vulnerability relationships and standard guidelines for creating new ones. By "seismic vulnerability relationships" is meant here repair costs, casualty rates, and probabilities of exceeding important damage states, as functions of ground-motion intensity, often conditioned on building category. These will be used in the broader context of estimating and manage seismic risk anywhere in the world. The GEM Vulnerability Consortium (GVC) led by its partners, with assistance from representatives of EERI, the Catholic University of Chile at Santiago, Geoscience Australia, Willis Ltd, and many others, has undertaken this task on behalf of GEM.

The GVC effort has 5 general thrust areas: empirical vulnerability functions (led by University College London), analytical vulnerability functions (University College London and National Technical University of Athens), expert-opinion vulnerability functions, empirical-national vulnerability functions (both led by the US Geological Survey in Golden), and casualty modelling (by Cambridge University). University of Colorado is coordinating GVC and leading efforts to deal with nonstructural vulnerability. In addition to its 5 thrust areas, GVC is supported by a team (Stanford) focusing on the proper treatment of uncertainty and on methods for performing Bayesian updating of existing vulnerability functions with new empirical information.

rasor.ntua.gr

The main objective of the RASOR project is to develop a systematic PBEE methodology for the seismic risk mitigation of industrial equipment structures, focused on the most important structures of a typical industrial facility: liquid storage tanks, industrial pressure vessels, industrial piping systems and their supports. This objective will be achieved through a multi-disciplinary approach which combines Civil and Mechanical Engineering with Earthquake Engineering, Engineering Seismology, Computational and Stochastic Mechanics, in a effort to produce an integrated seismic risk analysis framework, tailored to the specific characteristics and particularities of industrial installation structures, such as their geometry, high pressure and temperature, operational requirements, material aging and corrosive effects. Of particular importance are the increased safety requirements due the explosive or toxic content of such facilities.