Service life estimation and Durability Design of Concrete structures subject to destructive mechanisms

At present no rational basis exits for durability design of concrete structures subject to destructive mechanisms. Durability design has until now been based on deem-to-satisfy rules which are assumed to give a satisfactory service life. The research programme Probabilistic Performance Based Durability Design of Concrete Structures (in short DuraCrete), sponsored by the European Community, was initiated to develop a bas durability design of concrete structures. The methodology, applied to develop the d. basis, is described here and the design methodology is demonstrated in an illustrative example.