Life-cycle reliability of concrete bridges in an earthquake prone region and aggressive environment

Over the last two decades, the probabilistic assessment of reinforced concrete (RC) structures under seismic hazard has been developed rapidly. However, little attention has been devoted to the assessment of the seismic reliability of corroded structures. This paper presents a framework for computing the time-dependent seismic reliability of concrete bridges in an earthquake prone region and a marine environment. It includes: (a) estimate of seismic capacity of corroded RC components; (b) seismic and airborne chloride hazard assessment; and (c) seismic reliability of bridges with corrosion damage. The effects of seismic hazard, hazard associated with airborne chloride, and spatial distribution of steel corrosion on the time-dependent seismic reliability are investigated in this paper. The findings show that the time-dependent reliability of concrete bridge depends on both the seismic and airborne chloride hazards, and that the spatial distribution of steel corrosion has to be taken into consideration in the seismic reliability analysis.