PERFORMANCE-BASED SEISMIC ENGINEERING:CONVENTIONAL VS. INNOVATIVE APPROACHES

After historical and critical reviews of the state of the art and of the state of the practice of Performance-Based Seismic Engineering (P-B SE) and the role and importance of PerformanceBased Earthquake-Resistant Design (P-B EQ-RD), this paper briefly discusses a comprehensive approach for P-B EQ-RD of civil engineering facilities based on the use of energy concepts. The paper then attempts to answer the following questions: (1) Why do we need innovative approaches in Earthquake Engineering (EE)? (2) What are innovative approaches? (3) When can such innovative approaches be efficiently used? (4) How have these approaches been applied in practice? and (5) What are the impediments to the implementation of such approaches? Based on the use of the energy balance equation, a flow chart classifying the different conventional and innovative systems is presented. From analysis of the pros and cons of the conventional and innovative approaches, it becomes clear that the use of innovative approaches will result in more efficient control of the damage to structures and nonstructural components. The main impediment for widespread application of these innovative approaches is the lack of, or the over-conservative requirements of, code provisions for the P-B EQ-RD and P-B EQ-Resistant Construction (P-B EQ-RC) for the use of such innovative approaches and available systems and techniques.