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2
Grand Challenges in Earthquake Engineering Research
A fundamental goal of the workshop was to describe framework also could advance understanding of both
the high-priority grand challenges in earthquake engineering the direct and indirect impacts of earthquakes so that
research, which are represented by the problems, barriers, and community-level interactions and impacts can be
bottlenecks in the earthquake engineering field that hinder better characterized.
realization of the National Earthquake Hazards Reduction
2. Decision Making: Another sentiment reiterated dur-
Program (NEHRP) vision. Thirteen grand challenge problems
emerged over the course of the workshop. The committee has ing the workshop was that current research findings
summarized them in terms of five overarching Grand Chal- related to community resilience do not adequately
lenges to capture interrelationships and crossovers among influence decisions and actions on the part of key
the 13 problems and to highlight the interdisciplinary nature d ecision makers, such as private-sector facility
of their potential solutions. Participants noted that grand owners and public-sector institutions. Communities
challenge problems do not stand alone; they are complex, typically build based on traditional standards, and
and this complexity exists not only within earthquake engi- when affected by major earthquakes, they respond
neering but also in earthquake engineering’s position among and recover based on intuition, improvisation, and
other competing social challenges. As such, addressing a adaptive behaviors that are drawn from the individu-
grand challenge problem involves consideration of a variety als available to participate. Consequently, the lessons
of barriers—economic, regulatory, policy, societal, and learned in one community and event rarely translate
professional—along with the scientific and technological to the next community affected. Participants suggest-
solutions. The five overarching Grand Challenges are in- ed that achieving earthquake resilience could involve
tended to serve as useful focal points for discussions among a community-based, holistic approach that includes
stakeholders and decision makers planning future investment. decisions and actions that are based on overarching
Table 2.1 shows the grouping of the 13 problems into goals, a clear understanding of the built environment,
the five overarching Grand Challenges, and it also maps each rapid and informed assessment data, and planned
grand challenge problem to the disciplinary breakout group reconstruction and recovery. Mechanisms for mo-
from which it originated. These Grand Challenges are: tivating action could include developing incentives
to promote community development and pre-event
1. Community Resilience Framework: A common planning; simulation-based decision-making strate-
theme noted by workshop participants was that the gies for use in community development, pre-event
earthquake engineering community currently lacks planning, early response post event, and through the
an interactive and comprehensive framework for long-term recovery process; state-of-the-art decision-
measuring, monitoring, and evaluating community making tools that will lead to more efficient resource
resilience. Such a framework could apply innovative allocations; and methodologies and tools that allow
methodologies, models, and data to measure com- decision makers to compare different strategies for
munity performance at various scales, build on the post-earthquake reconstruction and long-term pre-
experience and lessons of past events, and ensure that earthquake mitigation.
past and future advances in building, lifelines, urban
3. Simulation: Participants noted that knowledge of the
design, technology, and socioeconomic research
result in improved community resilience. Such a inventory of infrastructure components and points
11
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12 GRAND CHALLENGES IN EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING RESEARCH
TABLE 2.1 Grouping of 13 Grand Challenge Problems into the Five Overarching Grand Challenges.
OVERARCHING GRAND CHALLENGES
Community
Dimension Resilience Decision
(Breakout Group) Grand Challenge Problem Framework Making Simulation Mitigation Design Tools
√ √ √ √ √
Community 1. Framework for Measuring, Monitoring, and
Resilience Evaluating Community Resilience
√ √ √ √
2. Motivating Action to Enhance Community
Resilience
√ √ √ √
Pre-event 3. Develop a National Built Environment Inventory
Prediction and
√ √ √
4. Multi-Scale Seismic Simulation of the Built
Planning
Environment
√ √ √
5. Integrated Seismic Decision Support
√ √ √ √ √
6. Risk Assessment and Mitigation of Vulnerable
Infrastructure
√ √ √ √
7. Protect Coastal Communities
√ √ √ √
Design of 8. Regional Disaster Simulator
Infrastructure
√ √ √
9. High Fidelity Simulation
√ √ √ √
10. New Sustainable Materials and Systems for
Earthquake Resilience
√ √ √ √
11. Harnessing the Power of Performance Based
Earthquake Engineering (PBEE) to Achieve
Resilient Communities
√ √ √
Post-event 12. Rapid Post-Earthquake Assessment
Response and
√ √ √ √
13. Reconstruction and Recovery
Recovery
NOTE: The dimension column on the left maps each grand challenge problem to the breakout group from which it originated; note that the grand challenge
problems do not represent consensus views of the breakout groups, but rather suggestions by individuals or groups of individuals during the breakout group
discussions (see Appendix A).
of connection between different infrastructure types ability, motivations, and mitigation strategies, and
is lacking within the earthquake engineering com- establishing mitigation solutions for the community’s
munity. They identified a need for scalable tools most vulnerable sectors. Participants suggested that
that autonomously create an accurate database of all mitigation solutions could be based on the use of a
infrastructure components, including points of inter- new generation of simulation tools and design solu-
dependency with other infrastructure components. tions coupled with up-to-date information available
Empowered with this complete mapping of an urban from distributed sensing systems. Development of
center’s infrastructure systems, powerful simula- better approaches for renewal and retrofit of the
tion technologies could model the time and spatial built environment’s most vulnerable sectors would
impacts of a seismic event at all length scales span- help ensure a safer environment and a more resilient
ning from the component scale to the regional scale, community.
and from disaster response to community recovery.
5. Design Tools: Participants suggested that developing
4. Mitigation: A large earthquake or tsunami in a highly and exploiting new emerging materials and innova-
populated region of the United States would cause tive structural concepts and integrating them within
massive damage to the built environment and com- design tools could dramatically improve the per-
munities in the region, and the resulting social and formance of all types of infrastructure and increase
economic consequences would cascade across the earthquake resilience in ways that are also sustain-
country, particularly if major energy, transportation, able. There is a wide range of sustainable highly
or supply hubs are affected. Key characteristics of resilient, new materials that can offer opportunities
this Grand Challenge include developing strategies to significantly change the way infrastructure is
to measure, monitor, and model community vulner- designed and constructed. Harnessing the power of
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13
GRAND CHALLENGES IN EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING RESEARCH
performance-based earthquake engineering (PBEE) standard methods or measures for resiliency, it is difficult to
could achieve a resilient infrastructure that incorpo- determine when resiliency has been achieved. This is because
rates these innovative new materials and structural current engineering approaches are limited in their ability to
systems. characterize resilience outcomes or to characterize them in
ways that are meaningful for end users.
The five overarching Grand Challenges are summarized
in the sections that follow. Characteristics of each Grand
Transformative Approaches to the Solution
Challenge are given, along with transformative approaches to
solving the grand challenge problems and the potential result- Many workshop participants emphasized that character-
ing impacts. Appendix A contains the original descriptions of izing community resilience will require a significant shift in
the 13 grand challenge problems from the breakout sessions. how the performance of communities is quantified. For ex-
ample, existing research programs in earthquake engineering
mainly focus on the performance of individual components
COMMUNITY RESILIENCE FRAMEWORK
or systems (e.g., buildings and specific lifeline systems),
whereas understanding the performance of a community
Description of the Problem
requires an understanding of the interactions among all of
Participants noted that although research has yielded these components. Many questions still exist, including: how
numerous findings related to community resilience, many does the performance of an electric power system affect the
of these findings do not influence decisions or actions performance of other lifeline systems? How does the disrup-
by key decision makers including private-sector facility tion of power affect local and regional businesses? How does
owners and public-sector institutions.1 Characterizing the an industry in an affected region impact other industries that
interactions and impacts at a community level necessitates may not have been directly impacted by damage? Multi-scale
an understanding of both the direct and indirect impacts of modeling of resilience could effectively relate these diverse
earthquakes, and a framework for measuring, monitoring, interactions.
and evaluating community resilience could help ensure that Another issue that has impeded the ability to measure
past and future advances in building, lifelines, urban design, and understand community resilience is the lack of historical
technology, and socioeconomic research result in improved data on recovery of communities from past disasters. Par-
c ommunity resilience. Such a framework could apply ticipants discussed the potential for a national observatory
innovative methodologies, models, and data to measure network to address the disaster vulnerability and resilience
community performance at various scales—e.g., building, of communities using methodologies applied consistently
lifeline, and community—and build on the experience and over time and space, with attention to complex interactions
lessons of past events. Participants reiterated that such an between changes in social systems, the built environment,
interactive and comprehensive framework is lacking within and the natural environment. They cited a 2008 workshop
the earthquake engineering community. In addition, many sponsored by the U.S. Geological Survey and the National
participants noted a need for basic research on the different Science Foundation that discussed the structure of such a
mechanisms for motivating action. This includes information network, called the Resiliency and Vulnerability Observatory
that stakeholders may use to quantify the costs and benefits Network (Peacock et al., 2008). Output from this network
of various mitigation strategies and the incentives for action could help foster many research projects on community
that are meaningful to various constituencies, ranging from resilience including:
laws and regulations to informally applied norms.
• Developing and testing community resiliency metrics
at different scales (e.g., communities, regions) and
Characteristics of the Grand Challenge
for different community components (e.g., buildings,
Because resilience is multi-dimensional and multi-scale, lifelines, social networks, economy).
achieving resilience requires a multi-disciplinary approach. • Researching, developing, and testing various meth-
The earthquake engineering research community is, for ods for quantifying resilience and determining the
example, unable at this time to define and measure multiple best method for stakeholder decision making.
dimensions of resilience. Workshop participants discussed • Creating a resilience observation pilot study, which
the need for a characterization of resiliency in terms of scale could be a candidate city, neighborhood, or group of
and metrics that are both applicable for diverse systems and buildings (see “Instrumented City”), setting a base-
for their interdependencies. Because researchers do not have line, and observing actions/changes over time to de-
fine metrics and timeframes of resiliency dynamics.
• Encouraging the development of quantitative recov-
1 See the white paper in Appendix B by Laurie Johnson, the keynote
ery models and developing theoretically and em-
speaker on community resilience: “Transformative Earthquake Engineering
pirically based models of post-earthquake recovery
Research and Solutions for Achieving Earthquake-Resilient Communities.”
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14 GRAND CHALLENGES IN EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING RESEARCH
DECISION MAKING
processes. For example, participants noted that
m odels could be integrated across dimensions
Description of the Problem
o f recovery—infrastructures, housing, business/
commercial facilities, public institutions, social/
Many workshop participants noted that achieving earth-
economic processes—and incorporated into simula-
quake resilience requires a community-based, holistic ap-
tion models that forecast recovery rates and patterns
proach that includes decisions and actions that are based on
after major earthquakes. These models could be
overarching goals, a clear understanding of the built environ-
designed to consider resilience, adaptation, sustain -
ment, rapid and informed assessment data, and planned re-
ability, and mitigation.
construction and recovery processes. Communities typically
• Developing multi-scale simulation models that
build based on traditional standards, and when affected by
link the performance of buildings and lifelines to
major earthquakes, respond and recover based on intuition,
communities.
improvisation, and adaptive behaviors that are drawn from
• Developing data-intensive methods for using public
the individuals available to participate. Consequently, the
and social network information and online network
lessons learned in one community and event rarely translate
activity to determine and develop resiliency metrics.
to the next community affected. In order to facilitate better
decision making, participants explained, meaningful data are
Impacts of the Solution to the Grand Challenge needed that allow end users to quantify current and improved
levels of community resilience. They stressed the importance
Many participants stated that a critical need for evaluat-
of using historical data when testing and validating strate-
ing community resilience is an understanding of “baseline”
gies for translating the results of quantitative and qualitative
m easures of resilience to enable measurements of the
studies on community resilience.
changes in resilience that take place over time. Such changes
could include reductions in expected losses that accompany
Characteristics of the Grand Challenge
the adoption and implementation of new codes, retrofit pro-
grams, and other improvements in the earthquake resistance
An observation reiterated during the workshop is that
of the built environment. They also could include changes
research on community resilience has not made a significant
in social vulnerability and resilience (such as those related
impact on the decisions and actions of decision makers. Prior
to fluctuations in income levels, migration patterns, and the
to a seismic event, for example, interest in seismic mitiga-
size of at-risk populations) and changes in exposure to risk
tion and preparedness is often limited or non-existent. Im-
(e.g., due to decisions to develop or to restrict development
mediately following an event, the environment within which
in hazardous areas). Participants stressed that observatory
decisions must be made by first responders and the public can
networks are needed, in part, because vulnerability and re-
be chaotic and complex, hindering optimal decision making.
silience are continually in flux. Research and methodological
A number of participants suggested that the scientific and
approaches that take into account ever-changing community
engineering community should explore the complexities
vulnerability and resilience profiles, in their view, would
of these operational environments and how they evolve on
be genuinely transformational. The lack of longitudinal
multiple length and time scales. They also expressed a need
resilience data makes it difficult or impossible to determine
for basic research to explore a variety of mechanisms for
whether measures that are intended to reduce future losses
motivating action, including:
actually make a difference. Such data could also reveal social
factors that affect resilience independent of the kinds of engi-
• Providing information and developing incentives for
neering advances that were emphasized during the workshop.
action.
Participants noted that the impact of a more holistic
• Developing simulation-based decision-making strat-
framework for measuring, monitoring, and evaluating com-
egies for use in community development, pre-event
munity resilience could be enormous. Better models and data
planning, early post-event response, and through the
for understanding community resilience could facilitate more
long-term recovery process.
effective decision making, and in turn, improved community
• Providing incentives to promote community develop-
resilience. Validated profiles of community performance that
ment and pre-event planning.
result from detailed and rich datasets from past events could
• Using state-of-the-art decision-making tools that
enhance the confidence of decision makers in the tools and
would lead to more efficient resource allocations.
methodologies developed by the research community. This,
• Developing methodologies and tools that allow
in turn, could enhance their use both before and after major
decision makers to compare different strategies for
earthquakes.
post-earthquake reconstruction and long-term pre-
earthquake mitigation.
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15
GRAND CHALLENGES IN EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING RESEARCH
• Performing case studies that demonstrate the efficacy expanded technology transfer that includes education studies
of proper planning and response after damaging to facilitate close collaboration between researchers and deci-
events. sion makers. Application of advanced information technology
(e.g., cloud computing, apps, and HTML5-enabled web) and
Participants suggested that exploring how society ap- social networking-style approaches could help to improve
proaches preparedness and post-event response and recovery resiliency communication, education, and decision support.
could help ensure that lessons are learned from past seismic Participants also noted that the current links between
events and applied to community development and rebuild- ubiquitous data streams, high-fidelity modeling, and effec-
ing, requiring a transition to a community-based risk man- tive decision making are weak or non-existent. These connec-
agement and resilience paradigm. tions could be enhanced by the development of an integrated
system that identifies events, creates and monitors real-time
data, updates models, incorporates crowd sourcing technolo-
Transformative Approaches to the Solution
gies, and informs decision makers. Real-time assessment of
Many participants expressed a need for more funda- damage to buildings and infrastructure could help in defining
mental research on decision making under conditions of effective recovery strategies that emphasize the rebuilding
uncertainty, and decision making for low-probability/high- of community sectors that promote rapid economic as well
consequence events, along with basic research and research as social development. This could lead to a paradigm shift
integration in areas such as public administration and public away from solely engineering solutions to a holistic suite of
policy, communication theory and practice, knowledge and resilience options including land use planning, performance-
technology transfer, and decision science. They suggested based construction standards, and different configurations of
that this research relate both to pre-event (planning, con- post-event reconstruction. However, participants also noted
struction standards, prioritization, simulators, training) and the challenges involved with developing such a system—the
post-event scenarios (emergency response and recovery). linkage between technological solutions and effective deci-
Ubiquitous sensor data would be required to drive the deci- sion making would need to address a number of fundamental
sion support engines. In the post-event period, heterogeneous social science and policy questions (e.g., in the context of
inputs and outputs from a range of linked simulation systems competing community needs, when is the most appropriate
(coupled with field sensor data) could be managed and as- time to promote an earthquake resiliency policy agenda?).
sessment information used to inform first responders for Participants stressed the importance of developing an inte-
efficient resource allocation. Precise quantitative assessment grated system that addresses loss reduction, decision mak-
of the damage state would be critical, along with an assess- ing, and complex cognitive, social, political, and economic
ment of the impact of damaged systems/components on other dimensions in this process.
interdependent systems. A partnership between engineers,
scientists, and the emergency management community
Impacts of the Solution to the Grand Challenge
could remove barriers for adopting new technologies, and
cyberinfrastructure could support the near-real-time delivery Workshop participants highlighted potential impacts
of information that supports post-event recovery activities. associated with meeting this Grand Challenge. Comprehen-
New information technologies could allow decision makers sive support engines for decision makers would likely lead
to share information across organizations without the threat to significant savings of lives and losses, transformative
of security leaks or breaches. potential for training and educating the next generation of
Many participants noted that efficient and accelerated professionals, direct dissemination of research into practice,
recovery requires timely post-event repair and rebuilding more rapid and accurate post-earthquake assessments (in
decisions that take into account models and tools to forecast terms of both response and recovery), and measurable output
long-term consequences and the impacts of potential mitiga- that allows decision makers to track and evaluate the impact
tion options (such as land buyouts, redesign/reconstruction of their decisions.
changes). In their view, current models do not adequately
reflect longer-term cascading impacts of large-scale disas-
SIMULATION
ters, and the resilience of repair technologies is not well
understood. An effective system of post-disaster mitigation
Description of the Problem
and recovery assistance could utilize a “resilience basis” to
determine best use of public funds. Participants noted that large-scale seismic events pose
Participants suggested that the integration of research countless safety and logistical challenges to dense urban
on risk communication and decision making with methods communities populated with both people and critical infra-
developed for resilience assessment, including simulation structure systems. Many dense urban centers have grown
and visualization studies, could lead to new approaches to over decades with multiple stakeholders involved in the
planning and stimulate action. Deployment could involve planning, construction, and management of the infrastructure
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16 GRAND CHALLENGES IN EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING RESEARCH
systems that support the economic prosperity and quality of could be created to link a heterogeneous array of simulation
life of the society. With these considerations in mind, work- tools to provide a complete toolset for regional simulation of
shop participants discussed the need for a new generation the impact of an earthquake and tsunami. High-performance
of high-performance simulation technologies to accurately computing technology that enables repeated simulation for
forecast the physical, social, and economic impacts of large- stochastic modeling of earthquake responses and commu-
scale seismic events on dense urban regions. nity responses would likely be a key technology. To update
and verify the multi-scale simulation environment, the data
generated by sensors embedded in the built environment for
Characteristics of the Grand Challenge
both seismic and infrastructure monitoring may be explicitly
Because of the complex growth patterns in urban utilized. A sensor fusion approach could incorporate other
regions, knowledge of the inventory of infrastructure com- forms of data including data derived from remote sensing
ponents and points of connection between different infra- technologies and crowd sourcing datasets.
structure types is lacking (NRC, 2011). Although individual
state agencies and utilities may maintain databases of their
Impacts of the Solution to the Grand Challenge
infrastructure systems, many of these databases are propri-
etary and use a myriad of database standards, making inter- Participants discussed the enormous potential benefits
operability challenging. Provided that infrastructure systems of such a rich and expressive simulator toolbox. A means of
are interconnected and have vulnerabilities at their points autonomously creating an accurate inventory of infrastruc-
of interconnection, there is an opportunity for new methods ture systems without relying upon the sharing of information
focused on autonomously creating a comprehensive data- from the many owners of the infrastructure components,
base that provides a complete mapping of all infrastructure some noted, would offer the engineering and social science
systems in a region. Hence, a number of workshop partici- community an unprecedented opportunity to utilize invento-
pants stressed the need for scalable tools that autonomously ries of infrastructure systems that enable regional modeling
create an accurate database of all infrastructure components, of the short- and long-term impacts of large earthquakes
including points of interdependency with other infrastructure and tsunamis. The tools that link simulation across multiple
components. Empowered with this complete mapping of an length and timescales could enable predictive modeling
urban center’s infrastructure systems, powerful simulation that could shape the community’s efforts in preparedness
technologies could model the time and spatial impacts of a yet allow emergency response officials to create optimal
seismic event at all length scales, spanning from the compo- plans that most efficiently allocate their scarce resources
nent scale to the regional scale, and from disaster response immediately after an event. Furthermore, simulation of how
to community recovery. infrastructure systems are interdependent, both in operation
and failure, could provide a wealth of new knowledge on how
complex, regionally distributed infrastructure systems are
Transformative Approaches to the Solution
vulnerable to regionally destructive events such as tsunamis.
Several participants noted that to effectively address the Beyond earthquake engineering, fundamental science aimed
Grand Challenge, wide gaps of scientific and engineering toward linking heterogeneous simulation tools that incor-
knowledge will need to be bridged to create transformative porate physical models with the simulation of community
solutions. These gaps were highlighted in the presentation response to disasters could facilitate discovery for other
by Omar Ghattas2 and in the “pre-event prediction and forms of natural and man-made hazards.
planning” breakout group discussions. For example, it will
be important to explore new technologies aimed toward the
MITIGATION
creation of a comprehensive urban infrastructure database
from both proprietary data sources (e.g., utilities’ inventory
Description of the Problem
databases) as well as from analysis of socioeconomic data
sources (e.g., census data, economic indicators). The end Community resilience, as described by participants
result will be the creation of an infrastructure “genome,” in the “pre-event prediction and planning” breakout group,
much like the genome used to map the fundamental protein fundamentally depends on developing risk assessment and
structures that make up life. Tools that allow the genome to mitigation strategies for the renewal and retrofit of the infra -
evolve with the growth patterns of the urban region itself structure sectors most highly vulnerable to earthquakes and
could be created to ensure long-term accuracy and validity. tsunamis. These sectors include water and wastewater supply
Powerful new forms of multi-scale computing architectures and distribution systems, power and energy infrastructure,
communication systems, transportation systems, at-risk
2
buildings, and coastal communities in seismic zones. A
See the white paper in Appendix B by Omar Ghattas, the keynote
speaker on Modeling and Simulation: “Uncertainty Quantification and number of participants noted that improvement in mitigation
E xascale Computing: Opportunities and Challenges for Earthquake
requires proactive changes in public policy that facilitate new
Engineering.”
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17
GRAND CHALLENGES IN EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING RESEARCH
strategies for safe and robust design and construction; pro- based on forecasting of future inventory, population
posals for innovative funding strategies to upgrade vulner- dynamics, and trends in design and construction.
able sectors of the built environment; and a range of options • Modeling interconnected and interdependent distrib-
available to create resilient designs for both existing and new uted systems, including lifelines.
systems. Consequently, it would be important to document • Accessing distributed sensor sets to update model
the current vulnerabilities within the built environment; to parameters to ensure accurate data for simulations,
prioritize the most crucial mitigation needs; and to develop and coupling simulations with sensor inputs.
cost-effective and sustainable mitigation strategies that are • Establishing a broad range of performance metrics to
embraced by the communities at risk. ensure decisions related to mitigation priorities.
• Integrating uncertainty modeling to facilitate in-
formed decisions.
Characteristics of the Grand Challenge
• Developing quantitative approaches that facilitate
A large earthquake or tsunami in a highly populated incorporation of individual and organizational moti-
region of the United States would cause massive damage vations for promoting mitigation.
to the built environment and communities in the region. • Modeling public and private funding strategies for
The resulting social and economic consequences would mitigation to enable thorough assessment of options.
cascade across the country, particularly if major energy, • Developing aggregate inventories of community risk/
transportation or supply hubs are affected. As an example, resiliency for use in land use planning and emergency
Kobe, Japan, has yet to recover completely from the 1995 planning.
Great Hanshin earthquake. Participants noted that the po- • Integrating mitigation strategies and new design
tential consequences of inadequate mitigation of the built solutions to reduce seismic and tsunami risks that
environment’s most vulnerable sectors are acute. Therefore, incorporate new developments in sustainable mate-
this Grand Challenge includes developing strategies for rials and technologies.
identifying and prioritizing the sectors of the national built
environment that are most vulnerable to catastrophic losses
Transformative Approaches to the Solution
from earthquakes and tsunamis, in addition to developing
approaches for renewal and retrofit of these sectors to ensure Participants suggested that the most effective strategies
a safer environment and a more resilient community. As for assessing risk and prioritizing mitigation strategies would
important, meeting this Grand Challenge involves provid- integrate related key elements that influence decisions on
ing fundamental strategies that mesh with related national renewal and facility retrofit or replacement. These elements
priorities—such as ensuring national competitiveness and might include, but are not limited to:
economic growth in key regions of the country that are vul-
nerable to seismic risk—as well as enabling new solutions • Strategic prioritization to achieve economic growth
for reviving the built infrastructure to ensure more sustain- and urban redevelopment.
able and secure communities. • Regional or local security.
Key characteristics of this Grand Challenge include • Public health objectives related to clean air and water.
developing strategies to measure, monitor, and model a • Energy policies and priorities.
community’s vulnerability, motivations, and mitigation • New methods of infrastructure procurement to maxi-
strategies, and establishing mitigation solutions for its most mize the amount of seismic and tsunami mitigation
vulnerable sectors. Strategies could be based on the use of that may be achieved within limited budgets.
a new generation of simulation tools and design solutions
coupled with up-to-date information available from distrib- Vulnerability assessment and prioritization of renewal
uted sensing systems. Individual participants noted that these options could be achieved through regional simulations and
strategies would require: design strategies that access data from an array of distributed
databases and sensor networks and link layered simulations
• Accessing an accurate inventory of built assets (e.g., of seismic and tsunami events. Participants indicated this
buildings, lifeline networks, socioeconomic data, could result in documentation of direct damage and socio-
policy data, natural environment, and topology). economic impacts as well as enhanced performance based
• Understanding the scope of possible seismic and on scenario mitigation solutions. New mitigation solutions
tsunami hazards, including the range of likely mag- could enable cost-effective retrofit and renewal options for
nitudes, locations, recurrence intervals, and ground the most vulnerable sectors of the community. Open access
motion characteristics. data architecture could enable access and use of distributed
• Developing advanced simulation tools that provide databases and sensor arrays. A number of participants noted
a range of information on potential catastrophic that new strategies to understand the linkages between the
consequences of scenario seismic and tsunami events physics-based phenomena that lead to infrastructure damage,
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18 GRAND CHALLENGES IN EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING RESEARCH
and socioeconomic and policy phenomena that result, are of potential repair, retrofit, and new construction
important for prioritizing the vulnerability of sectors of the methods.
infrastructure and regional populations. • Utilization of new materials and systems to develop
better, less-expensive options for repair and retrofit.
• Many constraints (e.g., complexity) that limit the use
Impacts of the Solution to the Grand Challenge
of PBEE in the design of new structures.
Solving this Grand Challenge could directly enhance • Extension of PBEE to incorporate a holistic assess-
community resilience. New strategies for identifying the ment of fragility including the involvement of non-
most vulnerable sectors of the built environment could help structural elements, foundations and soil-structure
communities to better mitigate seismic, tsunami, and related interaction, structure, building content, services,
cascading hazards. and the adjacent buildings. A more developed PBEE
could take into account multiple hazards—such as
fire, tsunami, and aftershocks—and consequence
DESIGN TOOLS
functions that consider the wider societal impact
of damage, including business interruptions and
Description of the Problem
downtime.
This Grand Challenge involves developing and exploit- • Reliable fragility data for the full range of infrastruc-
ing new materials and innovative structural concepts and ture types, including bridges, lifelines, and critical
integrating them within design tools to improve the perfor- structures requiring physical testing of components
mance of all types of infrastructure and to increase earth- and complete systems (some participants stated that
quake resilience in a sustainable manner. Participants noted although such systems are complex multi-scale prob-
a wide range of sustainable, highly resilient, new materials lems, a move away from empirical data is needed).
that offer opportunities to change the way infrastructure is • Fundamental research to understand the influence
designed and constructed.3 Innovative types of structural of aging and degradation of infrastructure in order
systems, such as self-centering systems with replaceable to develop appropriate fragility data for existing
fuses, could exploit these new stronger but more brittle ma- infrastructure.
terials. The power of PBEE could be harnessed to achieve
resilient infrastructure incorporating these innovative new
Transformative Approaches to the Solution
materials and structural systems. Participants emphasized
that fundamental research is needed to extend existing Participants acknowledged that achieving a high level
PBEE techniques for buildings to cover the full range of of confidence in performance prediction for materials,
infrastructures, including lifelines and other critical facilities. subsystems, and complete structures requires the avail-
Supporting all these developments in high-fidelity testing ability of high-fidelity testing and simulation techniques,
and modeling techniques would likely achieve a high level encompassing:
of confidence in performance prediction for the complete
range of infrastructure types. • The development of detailed mechanics-based
models for modeling materials and subsystems using
high-performance computing or parallel computing
Characteristics of the Grand Challenge
facilities to study system behavior over a wide range
Participants noted that this Grand Challenge would re- of scales.
quire fundamental research into new materials and structural • Creation of reference datasets from experimental
systems that have the potential to transform the construction, tests for analysis comparisons and blind predic -
repair, and seismic performance of infrastructure. Extensive tion studies to increase confidence in the numerical
testing and modeling would be needed before such develop- simulations.
ments could be implemented within existing PBEE method- • Development of methods for automated validation of
ologies. Some specific challenges to be addressed include: proposed analytical models against existing empiri-
cal datasets.
• New validated physics/mechanics-based models for • Development of software platforms and hardware-
the many new materials becoming available to the in-the-loop techniques for testing materials and
earthquake engineering community. structural components with realistic boundary con-
• Methodologies to assess the environmental (e.g., ditions and permitting physics-based modeling of
carbon footprint) and performance-related impact interdependencies among lifeline systems.
A number of participants also emphasized the need
3 See the white paper in Appendix B by John Halloran, the keynote
for development of new and emerging materials normally
speaker on Materials: “A Built Environment from Fossil Carbon.”
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19
GRAND CHALLENGES IN EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING RESEARCH
Impacts of the Solution to the Grand Challenge
used outside the construction sector (such as ultra-high-
performance concrete, carbon products, green binders,
Workshop participants noted that the development of
recycled materials, autoadaptive self-healing materials) that
new materials, systems, and design tools offers many oppor-
could be used for retrofit and construction of sustainable yet
tunities to create more resilient and sustainable societies. The
highly resilient infrastructure systems. This would require
composites—utilizing carbon or other materials—currently
research into innovative ways to incorporate such materials
being developed and used within other engineering sectors
in structures, energy capture, and brittle fuses, along with
have the potential to transform the way infrastructure is
research into methods for using these new materials and
designed and dramatically improve the resilience of infra-
techniques to create economical retrofitting systems and
structure systems in an earthquake. Participants expressed
protection systems. Participants noted that new methods
the view that most existing composites are not appropriate
would also be needed for incorporating reparability into
for infrastructure use, but more economical construction
new designs and the development of performance metrics to
grade variants of these materials would still be significantly
quantify resilience and sustainability in a holistic manner.
stronger and lighter than standard construction materials
Benchmarking could ensure reliable development of PBEE,
while being appreciably more sustainable. New materials
along with better analysis techniques and statistical methods
also offer opportunities to design economical retrofitting
for characterization of uncertainties. The development of
systems that could be appropriate for any community. Full
reliable fragility curves for bridges, lifelines, and critical
acceptance and implementation of PBEE has the potential to
systems would also be important. Extension of the building
transform the way all types of infrastructure are designed.
information management systems developed for building
New high-fidelity testing techniques could reduce the de-
infrastructure for the modeling lifeline systems could open
pendence of larger scale simulations on empirical evidence
up new ways to characterize such systems.
and support the development of more accurate decision
support tools. The potential exists to design and build vastly
improved protective systems, which might also incorporate
innovative features such as energy capture from the earth-
quake motion.
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