Energy based seismic design coefficients

Seismic Design Factors (SDF) are important parameters in current building codes to estimate the strength and deformation of the seismic force-resisting system. The current building code uses the SDF to economically design a building and achieve the basic life safety performance objective of a building. However, current seismic design is based on elastic analysis and only accounts for the in-elastic behavior of structures through these SDF which must be well-calibrated. This report uses the Energy Based Seismic Design (EBSD) process to calculate the SDF and compare it with the strength based SDF. It follows the recommended methodology provided by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) in the report FEMA P-695 which considers strength and deformation for quantifying the response parameters. The FEMA Methodology is further extended by using energy for quantifying building system performance and response parameters for use in seismic design by simultaneously considering strength and deformation. Hence, by using the energy-based method to quantify the seismic design factors, the effect of seismic action in terms of both force and displacement demands is considered and is compared with seismic factors currently in use.