Evaluation of Structural Reliability for Reinforced Concrete Buildings Considering the Effect of Corrosion

An approach to evaluate the structural reliability taking into account the degradation of the structural capacity due to corrosion of reinforced concrete buildings at the end of a time interval is proposed. The structural reliability is expressed in terms of the confidence factor, within a Demand and Capacity Factor Design format (DCFD). A new closed-form mathematical expression that considers the non-linear structural capacity degradation due to corrosion by means of a second degree polynomial function is developed. The confidence factors are obtained under the assumption that the structural capacity degradation due to corrosion follows a linear and non-linear function over a time interval. The structural reliability is obtained for a three-story reinforced concrete building subjected to two sets of real seismic ground motions recorded in Acapulco Bay Mexico. Both, aleatory and epistemic uncertainties are taken into account into the analysis. A maximum difference of 3.5% between both functions after 83 years from the construction of the building was found.